UC-NRLF 


I.I  HRARV 

OK  THK 

University  of  California. 

RECEIVED    BY    EXCHANGE 

Class 


The  Aesthetic    Experience:      Its    Nature 
and  Function  in  Epistemology 


By 

WILLIAM   DAVIS  FURRY 


A  Dissertation  Submitted  to  the  Board   of 

University  Studies  of  the  Johns  Hopkins 

University  in  Conformity  with  the 

Requirements   for  the  Degree 

of  Doctor  of  Philosophy 


OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY 

or 


THE  REVIEW  PUBLISHING  CO. 
BALTIMORE 
1908 


r 


PRESS  or 

WIIXI&MS    *     W11.KIN9    COMPANY 
BALnUORE 


ar 
*■ 


CONTENTS. 

Introduction v-xv 

PART    I. 

Chapter  I.     The  First  Immediacy 1-27 

I.     Description  of  Original  Experience I 

II.     Simplicity  of  Only  Relative 4 

III.  Its  Value  in  Present  Discussion 8 

IV.  Characteristic  Products  of g 

V.     Riseof  Dualistic  Experience 10 

Chapter  II.     The  Second  Immediacy  or  Semblant  Consciousness ll~23 

I.     The  Inner-Outer  Dualism 11 

II.     Memory  vs.  Fancy 12 

III.  Characteristics  of  the  Semblant  Object 13 

IV.  Place  of  the  Semblant  in  the  Development  of  Thought 21 

Chapter  III.     Dualistic  Character  of  Reflective  Experience 24-37 

I.     Content  of  Thought  Dualistic 27 

II.     Control  of  Thought  Dualistic 28 

III.  Types  of  Meaning  not  Rendered  in  Reflection 31 

IV.  Mystical  Outcome  of  Modern   Attempts  to  Transcend   the 

Dualism  of  Thought ^^ 

Chapter  IV.     The  Aesthetic  as  a  Hyper-Logical  Experience 38-64 

I.     Nature  of  Current  Epistemological  Problem 38 

II.     The  Nature  and  Outcome  of   the  Intellectualistic    ami  the 

Voluntaristic  Programme 40 

III.     Characteristics  of  the  Higher  Semblant  or  Aesthetic  Experi- 
ence Found  to  be  Those  Demanded  by  the  Epistemological 

Problem  of  Reflective  Thought 47 

IV.     Conclusion 61 


part  II. 

Chapter  \'.     Greek  Thought  to  Thalcs  as  Illustrative  of  the  First  imme- 
diacy   65-73 

I.     Characteristics  of  Primitive  Thought 66 

II.     The  Unreflective  Myths 68 

III.      I  he  Riseof  Duahsuc  Experience "Jo 


,90 


iv  COXTENTS. 

Chapter  VI.     Greek  Thouj^ht  from  Tlialtsto  Neo-Platonism 74~90 

I.     Riscof  Inntr-Outcr  Dualism 74 

II.     Democritus 76 

III.  Socrates  and  the  Sophists 77 

IV.  Plato,  Poet  rather  than  Scientist 78 

\'.     Aristotle  and  his  Treatment  of  Art 80 

VI.     Mystical  Character  of  Post -Aristotelian  Thought 84 

\II.     Neo-Platonism 88 

Chapter  VII.     Plotinus  to  Cierman  Mystics  of  Sixteenth  Century 91-105 

I.     GroNNth  of  Scholasticism  and  Mysticism 93 

II.     Augustine  and  his  P^mphasis  upon  the  Will 96 

III.     Individual  Thrown  Back  upon  Himself 98 

1\'.     The  Renascence 100 

\  .      1  he  Reformation 101 

VI.     The  Mystics,  Bohme  and  Others 104 

Chapter  VIII.     Descartes  to  Kant  and  German  Mystics 106-129 

I.     Dualism  of  Descartes  and  the  Occasionalists 106 

II.     Spinoza  and  Pantheism no 

III.  English  Empiricism 112 

IV.  Leibniz 115 

V.     The  Eaith  Philosophers,  Lessing,  Jacobi  and  Herder 117 

VI.      Kant  and  the  Third  Critique 1 19 

VII.     The  Mystics,  Maimon,  Reinhold,  Schiller,  etc 124 

Chapter  IX.     From  Kant  to  the  Present '30~i55 

I.     Post-Kantian  Idealism 130 

II.     Kichte 131 

III.  Schelling 133 

IV.  Hegel  and  his  Use  of  Art 136 

V.     Schopenhauer  and  Art 144 

\'l.     Modern  Attempts  to   Solve   the  Epistemological    Problem 

Presented  by  Reflective  Experience 1 47 

VII.     The  Present  Status  of  the    Epistemological    Problem   and 

the  Use  of  the  Aesthetic  Experience  as  a  Solution 149 


INTRODUCTION' 

That  the  epistemological  problem  is  the  most  urgent  in  cur- 
rent philosophical  discussion  is  to  be  inferred  from  the  intro- 
duction into  the  more  complete  works  of  Logic  and  Metaphysics 
of  topics  that  directly  pertain  to  neither.  The  preliminary 
discussions  found  in  such  works  as  Bradley's,  Bosanquet's,  and 
Sigwart's  Logic  are  not  however  psychological  precisely,  neither 
are  they  to  be  regarded  as  an  indication  that  Psychology  is  be- 
coming sufficiently  ample  in  its  programme  to  include  what  pre- 
viously was  regarded  as  subject-matter  of  more  or  less  independ- 
ent philosophical  disciplines.  The  introductory  chapters  in 
the  works  thus  named  are  rather  epistemological  than  psycho- 
logical. Paulsen  is  historically  justified  in  holding  that  Kpistem- 
ology  arises  always  as  a  critical  reflection  on  Metaphysics  with 
which  it  is,  at  the  first,  identified.  From  Kant  and  Locke  until 
now  the  conviction  has  been  growing  that  knowing  precedes 
being,  so  that  the  priority  which  Metaphysics  so  long  held 
should  be  given  to  Epistemology.  The  limitations  as  well  as 
the  possibilities  of  human  knowledge  are  to  be  sought  within  the 
knowing  process  rather  than  in  some  already  determined 
objective  existence. 

Since  the  time  of  Locke  and  Kant,  epistemological  inquiry 
has  been  increasingly  to  the  fore.  There  was  'constant  whetting 
of  the  knife'  until  the  time  of  Lotze,  who  felt  that  the  whetting 
process  should  end  and  an  actual  theory  of  the  object  of  knowl- 
edge established.  But  despite  the  constant  whetting  of  the 
knife  the  conviction  will  not  down  rhar  the  whetting  has  not 
yet  been  sufficiently  done. 

Both  Kant  and  Locke  were  embarrassed  by  metaphysical 
presuppositions  in  assuming  an  existence  falling  beyond  the 

'  This  Introduction,  while  intended  to  define  the  epistemological  problem, 
serves  also  in  a  measure  as  a  summar)'  of  the  writer's  position.  I  he  de- 
tailed references  to  the  authorities  mentioned  will  be  found  in  the  later  more 
extended  passages  of  the  essay. 

V 


vi  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

limits  of  thought.  The  objective,  as  determined  apart  from 
the  knowing  process,  held  the  determining  role  in  thought,  and 
continued  so  to  do  until  the  idealistic  reaction  of  the  Post- 
Kantians.  The  attempt  was  then  made  to  establish  the 
object  of  knowledge  wholly  in  terms  of  the  subject.  Self-con- 
sciousness was  held  to  be  the  sole  condition  of  knowledge. 
Experience  was  regarded  as  the  realization  of  a  single,  spiritual 
principle,  while  the  successive  modes  in  the  development  of 
knowledge  were  regarded  as  the  specific  ways  in  which  this 
one  principle  embodies  itself.  The  unity  of  experience,  which 
had  hitherto  been  sought  bevond  experience,  was  disclosed  in 
the  evolution  of  the  self.  Tiie  object  of  knowledge  becomes 
thus  intimately  related  to  the  subject  that  has  it  as  object. 

With  Hegel  the  self  came  to  be  identified  with  reflective 
thought.  Reality  came  also  to  be  identified  with  thought, 
since  being  which  should  fall  bevond  the  process  of  thought 
would  be  the  same  as  the  non-existent.  The  distinction  of 
subject  and  object  as  the  necessary  condition  of  knowledge 
at  any  stage  of  the  development  of  thought,  is  a  distinction 
of  mmd  from  itself  and  finds  its  completion  when  mind 
becomes  conscious  that  the  distinction  is  of  its  own  mak- 
ing. Nevertheless,  the  object  of  knowledge  to  be  vital  and 
fruitful,  must  be  more  than  is  already  given  in  thought.  The 
self  is  not  furthered  by  merely  revolving  its  own  perfections. 
If  the  object  is  not  more  than  the  subject,  thought  as  judg- 
ment, becomes  both  meaningless  and  useless.  This  position 
is  also  expressed  in  the  view  of  Lotze  that  'reality  is  richer  than 
thought',  and  in  the  statement  of  Bradley  that  'knowledge  is 
unequal  to  reality.'  All  these  expressions  are  based  upon  the 
conviction  that  thought  must  somehow  refer  to  a  real  beyond 
itself.  Thought,  therefore,  remains  dualistic  despite  the  at- 
tempted ultntification  of  its  two  aspects  in  terms  ot  rational 
thought. 

Kant  also  fountl  that  thought  as  such  is  dualistic  and  so 
concluded  that  "beyond  the  bounds  of  knowledge  there  is  a 
sphere  of  faith."  But  what  thought  could  not  do,  Kant  thought 
the  moral  consciousness  able  to  accomplish.  The  \  oluntarists, 
including  the  Bragmatists  of  the  present  time,  seek  in  turn  to 


INTRODUCTION.  vii 

make  the  will  the  exphiininc;  principle  of  the  mind  and  the  sole 
organ  of  reality.  But  Kant  found  that  the  moralistic  position 
is  also  dualistic  since  the  will  cannot  reduce  the  subject-matter 
of  thought.  Every  genuine  act  of  will  involves  a  struggle  upon 
the  part  of  the  subject  toward  its  object,  which  is  not,  as  yet, 
an  actual  possession.  The  object  of  the  will,  as  also  the  object 
of  thought,  must  represent  an  'other'  as  a  larger  and  more  com- 
plete experience,  in  which  the  dualistic  character  of  will  is  to  be 
transcended  by  being  absorbed  in  a  more  complete  experience. 

The  dualisms  of  both  the  theoretical  and  the  practical,  be- 
queathed to  modern  philosophy  by  Kant,  constitute  under  one 
form  of  statement  or  another,  the  epistemological  problem 
of  current  discussion.  Defined  as  the  dualism  of  mind  and 
body,  it  is  sufficient  to  indicate  that  it  cannot  be  solved  by  re- 
ducine  either  term  of  the  dualism  to  the  other.  This  means 
necessarily  the  loss  of  the  meaning  attaching  to  the  one,  without 
a  corresponding  increase  of  meaning  attaching  to  the  other. 
Both  terms  of  the  dualism  have  come  to  represent  definite 
types  of  meaning  and  any  attempt  at  a  solution  of  the  problem 
thus  set  by  ignoring  either  type  of  meaning  is  already  doomed. 
The  inability  of  any  one  of  the  more  modern  attempts  to  solve 
the  epistemological  problem  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact  that 
these  several  attempts  have  either  minimized  or  wholly  ignored 
one  or  the  other  of  these  types  of  meaning.  That  mind  cannot 
be  reduced  to  body  is  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  Materialism 
represents  a  passing  philosophy.  The  rapid  spread  of  idealistic 
philosophy  in  our  day  shows  also  how  easily  the  metaphysical 
doctrine  of  the  unreality  of  things  visible  and  tangible  can  be 
popularized.  Paulsen  is  abundantly  justified  in  his  character- 
ization of  modern  philosophy  as  tending  toward  idealism. 
The  inability,  however,  of  either  of  these  two  general  types  of 
philosophy  to  satisfy  the  mind  indicates  that  the  solution  of 
the  epistemological  problem  has  not  only  not  been  adecjuately 
achieved,  but  that  such  solution  can  be  attained  only  by 
reaching  a  farther  meaning  in  which  both  types  of  meaning 
are  merged  in  a  single  unitary  mode  of  experience. 

The  dualistic  character  of  the  epistemological  conscious- 
ness is  generally  recognized  in  current  discussion.     The  dual- 


viii  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPER!E\CE. 

ism  is,  however,  no  longer  regarded  as  a  datum  of  immediate 
experience,  but  rather  an  experience  into  which  consciousness 
develops.  The  epistemological  consciousness  [must  therefore 
be  treated  genetically  and  while  affirming  the  position  of  St. 
George  Mivart  that  "Kpistcmology  is  a  product  of  mental  ma- 
turity both  racial  and  individual,"  likewise  the  position  of  Or- 
mond  that  "the  distinction  of  subject  and  object  is  fundamental 
to  Kpistemology"  and  still  further  the  position  of  Professor 
Baldwin  that,  "it  is  only  when  the  mode  of  reflection  has  been 
reached,  in  which  the  subject  takes  the  objective  point  of  view, 
that  the  knower  becomes  an  Epistemologist,"  we  shall  main- 
tain in  the  present  discussion  that  the  epistemological  con- 
sciousness of  reflection,  with  its  characteristic  problem  of  uni- 
fication and  completion,  has  been  reached  only  when  conscious- 
ness has  passed  through  a  series  of  earlier  dualistic  experi- 
ences, in  each  of  which  the  epistemological  problem  presented 
itself.  No  one  mode  of  the  development  of  thought  is  to  be 
taken  exclusively  as  containing  the  explanation  of  the  whole, 
but  all  forms  of  knowledge  are  to  be  considered.  Taking  this 
point  of  view,  it  at  once  occurs  to  us  that  it  is  necessary  to  widen 
the  generally  accepted  notion  of  the  nature  of  the  epistemolog- 
ical consciousness  and  the  problem  which  it  presents. 

Upon  analysis,  thought  is  found  to  involve  always  the  pres- 
ence and  operation  of  two  moments,  which  in  reflective  thought 
are  recognized  as  'content'  and  'control.'  The  programme  of 
a  Genetic  l^pistemology  would  be  the  tracing  of  the  develop- 
ment of  thoutrht  both  in  the  individual  and  in  the  race  with 
respect  to  the  increasing  determinateness  of  these  two  aspects. 
Hegel's  Phnuomologic  des  G^/i-/rj-,  represents  an  attempt  in  this 
direction  but  lacks  the  psychological  point  of  view  requisite  to 
the  genetic  method.  Baldwin's  Thought  and  Things  is  the 
most  complete  and  satisfactory  attempt  yet  made  to  treat 
knowledge  genetically. 

In  the  light  of  such  a  mctiioii  of  treatment  ot  the  develop- 
ment of  thought  it  is  seen  that  thouglu  has  reached  the  dualism 
of  reflective  experience  onl\  by  passing  througli  a  series  of 
earlier  dualistic  experiences,  at  each  of  which  a  higher  mode  of 
conscious  determination  was  made  possible  by  the  establish- 


IXTRODUCTIO.X.  ix 

ing  of  a  more  comprehensive  and  complete  experience.  Each 
successive  mode  of  mental  determination  is  made  possible  and 
necessary  by  the  presence  in  consciousness  of  partial  and  frag- 
mentary meanings.  Thought,  as  Bradley  discerns,  is  always 
incomplete  and  must,  for  the  sake  of  its  own  completion,  be 
absorbed  in  a  fuller  experience.  The  Voluntarists  also  find 
the  ideas,  as  internal  meaning,  finite  and  fragmentary,  and 
this  necessitates  an  external  meaning  as  an  *other'  and  more 
complete  and  all-inclusive  experience.  Both  the  Intellectual- 
ists  and  the  Voluntarists  agree  that  thought  and  will  seek  an 
object  in  which  both  alike  are  to  be  completed.  But  such 
completion  is  necessarily  a  further  experience.  To  attempt  to 
solve  the  epistemological  problem  presented  at  any  stage  of  its 
genetic  development  by  a  return  to  genetically  earlier  experience 
means  a  mutilation  of  the  system  of  meanings  already  acquired, 
while  the  resulting  constructions  become  more  or  less  empty 
postulates. 

Despite  the  increased  discussion  of  the  epistemological 
problem  in  modern  philosophical  inquiry,  one  seeks  in  vain 
for  a  definite  statement  of  the  problem  itself.  According  to 
Bradley  it  is  the  problem  of  "forming  the  general  idea  of  an 
absolute  experience  in  which  all  phenomenal  distinctions  are 
merged — a  unity  which  transcends  and  yet  contains  every 
manifold  appearance  in  an  immediate,  self-dependent  and  all- 
inclusive  individual."  For  Bosanquet,  it  is  the  "work  of 
intellectually  constituting  a  totality  which  we  call  the  real 
world."  With  Royce,  who  proceeds  from  the  more  active 
aspect  of  consciousness,  and  makes  will  rather  than  thought 
the  explaining  principle  of  the  mind  and  the  organ  of  reality, 
the  epistemological  problem  presented  by  the  subject-object 
dualism  of  reflective  experience  is  the  "transcending  of  the 
subjective  by  the  process  of  completely  embodying,  in  indi- 
vidual form  and  in  final  fulfilnKiii.the  internal  meaningof  finite 
ideas."  The  Pragmatists  finall\-,  b\-  subordinating  the  theo- 
retical to  the  practical,  thus  identifying  the  true  and  the  good, 
attempt  to  solve  the  problem  by  reinstating  a  form  of  experi- 
ence in  which  stimulus  and  response,  as  the  two  aspects  of 
the  life  of  action,  regain  their  old-time  immediacy.     Group- 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 


ing  rhe  Pragmatists  wirh  rlu-  X'olunrarists,  it  is  to  be  said  that 
the\",  together  with  rht-  Inrellectuahsts,  represent  the  two  cur- 
rent t^■pes  of  epistenioiogical  theory,  while  both  alike  reach  the 
conclusion  that  the  epistenioiogical  problem  is  the  setting  up  of 
a  larger  and  more  complete  experience  in  which  the  limitations 
alike  of  thought  and  will  are  overcome. 

Defining  the  progress  of  cognition  again  as  an  increasing 
determinateness  of  the  two  aspects,  content  and  control,  the 
limitation  of  each  of  the  two  preceding  tvpes  of  epistenioiogical 
theory  becomes  evident.  Each  proceeds  by  attempting  t(» 
make  the  one  or  the  other  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought  an 
iiupcrium  m  impcrio^  and  both  reach  the  common  conclusion 
that  either  of  these  two  aspects  cannot  interpret  the  whole  of 
experience.  Assuming  that  reflective  thought  involves  the 
subject-object  dualism,  the  Intellectualists  attempt  to  reconcile 
the  dualism  thus  presented  by  an  exclusive  emphasis  upon  the 
side  of  the  object  as  a  related  content.  The  control  aspect, 
according  to  Bradley  is  "something  necessary,  but  still  per 
accidcns.  And  as  thought  can  not  make  phenomena,  it  con- 
tents itself  without  them  and  is  therefore  symbolic  and  not 
existential."  Whatever  form  and  structure  the  content,  of 
knowledge  may  come  to  show  are  dependent  upon  the  laws  of 
thought.  The  control  aspect,  however,  retains  its  primitive 
value  and  validity,  while  the  presented  contents,  as  the  result  of 
a  process  of  increasing  contextuation,  become  but  sublimated 
symbols  of  the  reality  which  thev  once  constituted.  The  dual- 
ism of  the  intellectualists  represents  the  presence  and  conflict  of 
two  sorts  of  experience,  one  immediate,  characterized  by  lack 
of  reference  beyond  mere  psychic  existence,  and  the  other  medi- 
ate, characterized  by  the  relational  and  discursive  character  of 
thought.  The  epistenioiogical  problem  is  occasioned  b\'  the 
conflict  of  these  two  types  of  experience,  a  conflict  arising  onlv 
when  reflection  is  reached,  and  finds  its  solution,  for  the  time 
being,  b\'  a  process  of  making  thought  tncrelv  ps}cliic,  thus 
identif\ing  the  mediate  with  the  primitive  immediacy,  l^radley 
is  at  pains  to  indicate,  however,  that  the  conflict  between 
these  two  types  of  experience  is  due  to  the  presence  of  reflective 
thought,  rather  than  the  reverse,  as  the  Voluntarists  and  Prag- 
matists  are  today  insisting. 


INTRODUCTIOX.  xi 

The  latter,  as  representing  a  second  type  of  epistenioiogical 
theory,  seek  to  overcome  the  duahstic  character  of  reflective 
experience  by  phicing  ahiiost  exclusive  emphasis  upon  the 
control  aspect  of  thought,  inwardly  or  subjectively  interpreted. 
The  object  of  thought,  they  hold,  must  represent  the  expression 
and  embodiment  of  the  subject  as  the  inner  organizing,  deter- 
mining principle  ot  knowledge.  The  object  of  knowledge  is 
what  it  is  only  because  the  subject  means  it  as  its  own  (jbject. 
Ideas  as  content  of  thought  are  acts  of  will  as  well  as  acts  of 
cognition,  and  the  object  of  thought  is  but  the  embodiment  and 
fuihlment  of  an  exclusive  act  of  will  or  purpose.  The  subject 
of  knowledge  can  acknowledge  no  object  other  than  those  of 
its  own  determination.  What  therefore  the  content  of  thought 
is,  as  well  as  the  relational  character  which  characterizes  it, 
is  determined  solely  in  terms  of  the  zcill  as  the  controlling 
and  organizing  moment  of  experience. 

But  it  is  found  that  both  types  of  epistenioiogical  theory  are 
inadequate,  in  that  each  finds  meanings  which  it  is  not  able  to 
reduce  in  terms  of  its  explaining  principle.  The  Intellectual- 
ists  find  with  Bradley  that  thought  can  never  harmonize  its  own 
content,  meaning  that  thought  as  such  can  never  transcend  the 
dualism  of  the  'that'  and  the  'what'  as  the  two  aspects  of 
thouglit.  The  more  complete  thought  becomes  as  a  relational 
system  the  deeper  and  broader  becomes  the  dualism.  To 
attain  reality  as  the  object  of  thought,  meaning  an  experience  in 
which  these  two  aspects  of  thought  are  reconciled,  means  neces- 
sarily breaking  with  thought,  so  that  the  conclusion  is  reached 
in  the  present  discussion  that  reality,  as  a  unified  experience, 
becomes  for  the  Intellectualists  an  a-logical  and  m\stical  postu- 
late. 

The  Voluntarists  likewise  find  that  will,  as  the  controlling 
and  organizing  aspect  of  thought,  is  also  dualistic,  since  it  is 
unable  to  reduce  the  subject-matter  of  reflective  thought.  To 
reduce  the  true  to  the  good,  as  for  instance  Professor  James 
does  in  his  recent  lectures  on  Pragmatism,  only  shifts  the  em- 
phasis of  the  dualism.  The  dualism  remains  as  one  of  end  or 
good  and  fact,  together  with  the  epistenioiogical  problem  of  its 
reconciliation.     Will    can  not  harmonize  its  content  with   the 


xii  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCC. 

data  of  thought,  and  the  attempt  to  solve  the  cpistemological 
problem  thus  presented  by  making  the  will  all-sufficient  by 
reaching  a  'volitional  immediacy'  in  which  the  ivtll  wills  only 
Its  own  will,  is  to  set  up  an  :i-\()liri()n:il  postulate  wliich  is  also 
mystical. 

The  Hnal  outcome  of  these  two  t}'pes  of  epistemological 
theory  is  closelv  identical,  in  that  both  alike  reach  an  absolute 
experience  which,  as  the  completion  alike  of  the  finite  and  frag- 
mentary character  of  thought  and  will,  'is  not  anything  but 
sentient  experience.'  Such  is  the  necessary  outcome  of  anv 
epistemological  theory  which  proceeds  by  ignoring  either  of 
the  two  aspects  of  thought.  The  strength  of  each  type  of 
theory  however  represents  the  weakness  of  the  other.  The 
farther  the  \'oluntarist  pushes  his  programme,  the  more  he 
reveals  the  need  ot  thought  as  lending  value  and  meaning  to 
the  life  of  will.  Whatever  meaning  is  found  attaching  to  the 
practical  life  is  borrowed  from  reflective  and  rational  experi- 
ence. The  fact  is  that,  if  the  will  were  able  to  will  itself,  to 
operate  as  it  were  in  a  void,  occasion  for  an  acr  oi'  will  would 
never  arise.  Professor  Royce  is  quite  right  in  holding  that  the 
active  life  is  motived  by  the  finite  and  fragmentary  character  of 
finite  ideas.  But  a  farther  experience,  in  which  present  expe- 
rience as  limited  and  mcomplete  is  made  more  complete,  can 
not  be  reached  by  reverting  to  an  earlier  more  immediate  mode; 
the  absolute  experience  must  represent  fulfilment,  not  destruc- 
tion. And  likewise,  the  farther  the  Intellectualist  extends  his 
programme,  the  more  is  felt  the  need  of  bringing  thought  into 
more  fruitful  relations  with  the  more  active  and  selective 
aspects  of  experience.  Thought  as  such  is  pale  and  as  it  were 
removed  from  the  concrete  character  of  life  as  actually  lived. 
It  only  "formulates  and  duplicates,  divides  and  recombines 
that  fullness  of  reality  which  is  had  directly  and  at  first  hand 
in  sense  experience."  Hradley  recognizes  the  static  character 
of  reflective  thoutrht,  init  is  unable  to  avoid  this  outcome.  The 
\'()luntarists,  with  Professor  Royce,  also  appreciate  that  the 
dualistic  character  ot  reflective  experience  can  be  transcended 
only  in  a  tulkr  and  richer  embodiment  of  whatever  meanings 
consciousness  already  has.     Neither  type  of  theory  can    limit 


INTRODUCTION.  xiii 

itself  to  its  own   programme  because  each  proceeds  by  abstract- 
ing one  of  the  two  essential  aspects  of  knowledge. 

These  criticisms  suggest  that,  if  knowledge  is  to  escape  from 
the  cul-de-sac  in  which  reflective  experience  involves  it,  it  can 
do  so  onlv  in  some  mode  of  experience  in  which  the  two  aspects 
of  thought,  content  and  control,  with  whatever  meanings  attach 
to  them,  are  brought  together  in  some  larger  whole.  The 
determination  of  such  a  mode  of  experience  represents  the  epis- 
temological  problem  par  excellence.  Such  experience  will  be  in 
type  neither  purely  rational  and  static  nor  wholly  volitional  and 
dynamic;  it  must  be  a  mode  in  which,  as  Professor  Baldwin 
says,  "experience  can  find  its  dynamics  intelligible  and  can  act 
upon  its  static  meanings  as  immediate  and  dynamic  satisfac- 
tions." 

The  burden  of  the  present  discussion  is  that  the  aesthetic 
experience  represents  a  mode  of  conscious  determination  in 
which  the  two  aspects  of  thought  are  recognized  and  reconciled 
by  the  rise  of  a  new  mode  of  immediate  experience. 

The  essential  character  of  this  type  of  experience  is  the  *sem- 
blant'  treatment  of  meanings  already  present  for  the  sake  of 
further  meaning  as  fulfilling  personal  purposes.  By  this  method 
of  treating  meanings  already  present  as  having  a  further  mean- 
ing, using  present  meanings  as  schemata  for  more  complete 
meanings,  consciousness  completes  the  othenvise  incomplete 
and  fragmentary  character  of  its  present  store.  The  epis- 
temological  problem  of  the  Intellectualists  is  precisely  the 
problem  of  setting  up  of  an  'other'  as  a  richer  experience  in 
which  thought  as  incomplete  might  complete  itselt.  On  the 
other  hand  the  epistemological  problem  of  the  V'oluntarists  is 
that  of  discounting  a  future  experience  which,  as  external  mean- 
ing, completely  embodies  the  othersvise  finite  and  fragmentary 
character  of  finite  ideas.  Both  alike  hold  that  the  experience  in 
which  thought  and  will  are  completed  is  a  state  of  immediacy  in 
which  both  theoretical  and  practical  interests  are  wholly  satis- 
fied. But  each  type  of  theory,  failing  to  recognize  the  mediatory 
role  of  the  semblant  treatment  of  an  already  guaranteed  content, 
has  to  fall  back  on  a  mode  of  reality  beyond  its  own  monistic 
postulate,  thus  hugging  to  itself  a  mass  of  ill-gotten  gain. 


xiv  THE  AESTHETIC  E.\PERIE\CE. 

In  tlu-  present  discussion  it  is  shown  that  the  .xsthetic  arises 
with  the  episteniological  alike  in  the  race  and  in  the  individual; 
that  the  .esthetic  experience  has  passed  through  a  series  of  stages 
of  development  at  each  of  which  it  reflects  the  epistemological 
problem  then  present  and  crying  for  solution.  Upon  analysis, 
the  aesthetic  experience  at  each  of  these  several  stages  is  found  to 
possess  precisely  those  characteristics  which  enable  it  to  reduce 
the  several  meanings  which  neither  thought  nor  will  can  of  itself 
reduce.  As  Kant  long  ago  perceived,  neither  the  theoretical  nor 
the  practical  reason  can  heal  the  wound  that  reflection  makes. 
The  need  is  for  a  type  of  interest  siii  generis;  and  this  is  what  we 
find  the  xsthetic  interest  to  be.  It  represents  a  treatment  of 
meanings  already  acquired  for  the  sake  of  the  further  meaning 
that  inspires  them,  the  process  of  reaching  a  completer  experience 
— an  ideal  whole — through  the  schematic  treatment  of  earlier 
partial  experiences  of  thought  and  will.  The  object  thus  con- 
structed is  held  up  and  treated  as  being  what  it  is  not  and  as  be- 
ing everything  save  precisely  what  in  its  concrete  isolation  it  is. 
It  sets  up  the  'other'  of  thought  as  a  further  meaning  which  wjiile 
not  realized,  can  nevertheless  be  treated  'as  it  it  were.'  1  he 
object  of  thought  thus  constructed  does  not  break  with  experi- 
ence, since  it  represents  a  more  complete  experience.  I  here  is 
a  focusing  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought  by  a  process  of  detach- 
ment from  the  original  spheres  in  which  they  hold  as  mediate 
experiences,  by  the  setting  up  of  a  larger  whole  of  experi- 
ence in  which  both  aspects  become  moments  in  what  is  imme- 
diate. 

The  aesthetic  experience  thus  represents  the  expression  of  an 
interest  which  is  neither  theoretical  nor  practical.  Because  of 
this,  it  is  fitted  to  reconcile  and  unify  these  two  types  of  interest. 
It  is  true,  as  Professor  Tufts  contends,  that  the  a-sthetic  did  not 
arise  to  satisfy  an  already  existing  sense  of  the  beautiful;  but  to 
identify  it  with  either  of  the  two  recognized  types  of  interest 
means  to  reduce  the  .tstluric  to  the  limitations  from  which  it 
seeks  to  disengage  them.  The  point  to  be  insisted  upon  in  the 
present  discussion  is  the  fact  that  the  a-sthetic  can  not  be  reduced 
to  any  form  of  mediate  experience,  without  at  once  bringing 
about  its  own  destruction;  this  (jualihes  it  as  a  mode  of  experi- 


INTRODUCTION.  XV 

ence   in  whicii  these  several  mediate  types  arc    reconciled  and 
the  entire  psychic  function  furthered. 

Defining  genetic  episteniology  as  the  tracing  out  ot  the  de- 
velopment of  thought  with  reference  to  the  increasing  deter- 
minateness  of  its  two  aspects  of  content  and  control,  and  dcHn- 
ing  the  epistcmological  problem  as  that  of  tlie  furthering  of  these 
two  aspects  without  the  sacrifice  of  either,  by  the  establishing 
of  a  more  complete  experience  m  a  new  and  higiier  immediacy 
which  in  turn  becomes  the  platform  for  still  higher  reaches  of 
thought;  and  further  defining  the  X'sthetic  experience  as  a  mode 
of  conscious  determination  in  which  the  guaranteed  meanings  of 
consciousness  are  mediated  with  reference  to  a  further  and 
ideal  experience — an  experience  whose  value  lies,  as  Professor 
Baldwin  says  "in  discounting  in  advance  any  new  demands  for 
mediation  which  new  dualism  may  make,"  the  epistemological 
function  of  the  aesthetic  at  once  becomes  evident.  1  he  'abso- 
lute' experience  is  thus  reached.  It  is  not  a  formal  and  static 
experience,  such  as  the  Intellectualists  reach,  nor  is  it  a  blind  and 
meaningless  dynamic  as  the  Voluntarists  teach;  but  it  is  rather 
an  experience  which  is  richer  and  completer  than  either  thought 
or  will  or  both  together,  since  it  represents  an  experience  in 
which  the  'genetic  dynamogenies  as  well  as  the  static  dualisms 
are  mediated.' 

'  Baldwin,  Psychological  Bulletin,  Vol.  IV' ,  No.  4,  April,  1907;  see  also  Thought 
and  Things,  Vol.  II,  Appendix,  II.  My  indebtness  to  Professor  Baldwin,  both 
with  respect  to  general  ideas  and  to  details,  will  be  evident  to  the  reader.  I 
w  ish  especially  to  acknowledge  the  use  of  material  from  his  unpublished  lectures 
on  the  nature  and  role  of  the  xsthetic. 


1> 

OP    THE 


^NIVERSiXY 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERn:NCE:  ITS  NATURE  AND 

FUNCTION   IN   EPISTEMOLOGV. 

PART  I.     EXPOSITORY. 

Chapter  I. 

The  First  Immediacy  as  Illustrating  an  A-dualistic  Conscious- 
ness and  as  being  Pre-epistemological  and  Pre-aesthetic. 

Mr.  A.  E.  Taylor  has  pointed  out  that  the  character  of 
experience  for  the  metaphysician  is  its  immediacy,  meaning 
thai  character  of  experience  in  which  existence  and  content 
considered  as  the  two  aspects  of  reflective  thought  are  not  sepa- 
rated in  consciousness.  Such  immediacy,  he  proceeds  to  say, 
may  be  due  to  the  absence  of  reflective  analysis  of  the  given  con- 
tent into  its  constituent  aspects,  or  it  may  be  due  to  fusion,  at  a 
higher  level,  into  a  single  directly  apprehended  whole,  of  the 
results  won  by  the  processes  of  abstraction  and  analysis.  There 
is,  he  concludes,  an  immediacy  which  is  below  reflective  thought, 
as  well  as  an  immediacy  which  is  above  it.  It  is  with  what  Mr. 
Taylor  calls  the  immediacy  below  reflection  that  we  have  to  do 
in  the  present  chapter.* 

That  consciousness,  alike  in  the  individual  and  the  race,  is, 
in  its  first  appearance,  immediate  in  the  sense  of  being  a-dual- 
istic, is  a  conclusion  by  no  means  peculiar  to  Mr.  I  a)l<)r. 
Psychologists  and  anthropologists  alike  hold,  fii;it  conscious- 
ness, in  its  first  appearance,  is  undifferentiated  and  protoplasmic, 
the  'big,  booming  confusion'  of  James,  the  'unditterentiatcd 
continuum'  of  Ward,  and  the  'relatively  pure  ojijectivity'  of 
Baldwin.  These  several  writers  agree  in  holding  that  primitive 
consciousness  is  a-dualistic  in  the  sense,  that  there  is  present  in 
consciousness  no  distinction  between  given  data  and  the  result- 
ing constructed  meanings.  "The  child"  as  James  says,  "docs 
not  see  light,  but  is  light."  lo  open  the  eyes  is  precisely 
seeing.     There  is  no  reference  of  presentations  to  the  external 

'  A.  E.  Taylor,  Melaphysics,  p.  32. 

I 


2  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

world  Since  at  rhis  stage  of  conscious  development  there  is  no 
distinction  made  between  content  and  other  things.  "  1  here 
was  a  time"  sa)s  Bradley,  "when  the  separation  of  the  outer 
world  as  a  thing  apart  from  our  feelings  had  not  even  begun."' 
And  again  he  says,  "in  the  beginning  there  is  nothing  be\ond 
what  is  presented ;  what  is,  is  felt,  or  is  rather  felt  simplv.  Ihere 
is  no  memory  or  imagination  or  fear  or  thought  or  will  and  no 
perception  of  likeness  or  difference.  There  are  in  short  no 
relations  and  no  feelings  but  only  feeling.  In  all  one  blue  with 
differences  which  work  and  are  felt,  but  are  not  discriminated."^ 
A  more  recent  description  of  this  first  immediacy  is  given  by 
Professor  James  under  the  caption  'Pure  Experience.'  "Pure 
experience"  he  says,  "is  the  name  wiiich  I  give  to  the  original 
flux  of  life  before  reflection  has  categorized  it.  Only  new- 
born babes  and  persons  in  semicoma  from  sleep,  drugs,  ill- 
nesses or  blows  can  have  an  experience  pure  in  the  literal 
sense  of  a  that  which  is  not  yet  an\'  definite  what,  though 
ready  to  be   all  sorts  of  whats.     .     .  Pure    experience    in 

this  state  is  but  another  name  for  feeling  or  sensation.  Put  the 
flux  of  it  no  sooner  comes  than  it  tends  to  fill  itself  with  emphases 
and  these  to  become  identified  and  fixed  and  abstracted;  so  that 
experience  now  flows  as  if  shot  through  with  adjectives  and 
nouns  and  prepositions  and  conjunctions.  Its  purity  is  only  a 
relative  term  meaning  the  proportional  amount  of  sensation 
which  it  still  embodies.  ...  In  all  this  the  continuities 
and  discontinuities  are  absoluteh'  coordinate  matters  of  immedi- 
ate feeling."-' 

It  is  assumed,  therefore,  that  within  this  hrst  immediac\'  the 
distinctions  characteristic  of  reflective  thought  are  not  present. 
To  be  in  consciousness  and  to  be  apjirehended  are  identical  and 
It  is  a  matter  of  no  difference  whetiur  we  speak  of  this  ftwling 
or  feeling  this.  The  Hrst  immediacy  represents  a  totalit}-  or 
continuum  holding  wholh'  within  its  own  grasp.  Whatever 
the  object  ma)'  come  to  be,  it  does  so  through  the  process  in 


'  Bratilcy,  A  ppramnrf  an  J  Krnlitv,  p.  261. 

*  MinJ,  O.  S.  Vol.  \II,  p.  343.     Cf.  also  HraJItv,  Prinriplfs  of  Logic,  p.  457. 

*  Quoted  by  Prof.  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  I,  p.  25. 


THE  FIRST  IMMF.DlACr.  3 

which  it  arises.  There  is  no  distinction,  within  this  early  con- 
sciousness, between  an  object  and  our  perceiving  it,  and  the 
resulting  construction  represents  the  unity  of  the  object  in  per- 
ception. The  knower  and  his  world  stand  upon  the  same  basis 
of  reality  in  undisturbed  feeling.  Any  particular  form  of  sense- 
experience  is  but  a  modification  of  the  undifferentiated  sensory 
continuum.  As  yet  there  are  no  distinct  forms  for  the  different 
senses  and  whatever  of  discreteness  or  discontinuity  or  variety 
may  be  found  within  this  early  experience  must  be  sought  for 
on  the  side  of  the  sensory  content.  This  content  both  stimulates 
the  active  processes  of  the  individual  and  serves  as  a  center 
around  which  these  processes  gather.  Things  and  not  isolated 
sensations  thus  come  to  be  the  first  results  reached  by  conscious- 
ness and  while  in  this  first  experience  there  is  no  distinction  to 
be  drawn  between  things  and  thought,  things  are  nevertheless 
to  be  regardedashavingtheunityof  objects  in  perception.  What- 
ever the  presented  object  comes  to  be  it  represents  thus  an 
immediate  unity  of  consciousness. 

Emphasis  is  laid  upon  this  first  immediacy  of  consciousness 
in  the  present  discussion  since,  by  almost  universal  agreement, 
it  is  regarded  as  the  type  of  consciousness  in  which  we  are 
brought  into  closest  contact  with  what  later  becomes  the  coeffi- 
cient of  reality.  Present-day  metaphysicians  are  almost  unani- 
mous in  maintaining  that  reality  as  an  absolute  experience  is 
realized  onl\'  is  some  form  of  immediacy  of  consciousness. 
Bradley  explicitly  holds  that  reality  is  a  matter  of  immediate 
experience  and  his  further  characterization  of  such  immediacv 
as  a  state  of 'sheer  sentience,' as  a  state  of  undifiercnriated  feeling, 
identifies  his  absolute  experience  with  this  first  immediacy  of 
consciousness.  'The  will-to-believe'  of  Professor  James  and 
the  'volitional  immediacy'  ot  I'rofessor  Royce  must  be  inter- 
preted in  a  similar  waw 

\\  hether  this  first  immediac\'  of  consciousness  be  identified 
with  reality  as  an  absolute  experience  and  all  else  made  phe- 
nomenal, or  used  onlv  as  a  type  of  experience  in  which  reality 
is  actually  given,  the  fact  remains  that  the  analysis  of  this 
a-dualistic  consciousness  has  been  motived  by  certain  meta- 
physical  presuppositions.     Assuming  that  reality  can  be  given 


4  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

onlv  in  an  immediacy  of  consciousness  and  assuming  still  further 
that  this  immediacy  is  due  to  the  absolute  simplicity  of  the 
primitive  consciousness,  metaphysicians  at  once  proceed  to 
analyze  this  first  immediacy.  As  a  result  three  types  of  epistem- 
ological  theory  have  been  brought  forward  in  modern  dis- 
cussion, viz.,  the  Inrellectualistic,  the  AfFectivistic  and  the 
Voluntaristic,  each  attempting  to  make  some  one  aspect  of 
developed  consciousness  the  explaining  principle  of  conscious 
development  as  well  as  the  sole  organ  of  reality. 

Each  of  these  three  types  of  epistemological  theory  proceeds 
upon  the  assumption  that  consciousness  is,  in  its  primitive  stage, 
wholly  simple,  in  the  sense  that  only  one  of  the  later  aspects  is 
present.  Experience  thus  comes  to  be  regarded  as  the  realiza- 
tion of  some  one  principle,  that  is,  in  other  words,  each  stage  of 
conscious  experience  is  but  the  embodiment  in  a  specific  mode 
of  this  one  principle  and  these  successive  modes  in  the  actualiza- 
tion of  this  one  principle  differ  only  in  the  way  in  which  it  is 
embodied.  Mental  development  thus  becomes  the  necessary 
evolution,  through  various  modes,  of  a  single  principle.  Hegel's 
Ph'anomenologie  des  Geistes  represents  an  attempt  in  this  direc- 
tion in  assuming  rationality  as  the  explaining  principle  of  the 
mind,  while  Herbert  Spencer's  Synthetic  Philosophy  represents 
a  similar  attempt,  although  in  a  wholly  antipodal  way.  The 
more  modern  movement  in  philosophy  generally  known  as 
'Pragmatism,'  with  its  characteristic  interpretation  of  experi- 
ence solely  in  terms  of  the  practical  and  the  identifying  of  the 
true  and  the  beautiful  with  the  good,  is  to  be  regarded  not  only 
as  a  revolt  from  Hegel  and  Green  but  also  as  an  attempt  to  make 
u///  the  explaining  principle  of  mental  development  and  the 
organ  of  reality.' 

From  an  analytical  point  of  view,  however,  the  simplicity  of 
the  first  immediacy  of  consciousness  is  relative  only.  Every 
presentation  is  also  a  determination.  From  the  begmnmg  con- 
sciousness is  active  and  constructive.  "The  so-called  imme- 
diate intuition,"  says  Green,  "has  content  only  m  so  far  as  it 


I 

ence 


See  Jamts.  Priicm.jtism.  p.  -6,  and  also  Miss  Adams,  The  .lestbettc  Expert- 


THE  FIRST  IMMEDIACY. 


is  not  merely  presentative."'  Consciousness  is  never  purely 
a-noetic.  Every  'that'  is  also  a  'what.'  What  the  presented 
content  is  determined  to  be  depends  upon  the  active,  disposi- 
tional tendencies  of  the  individual.  To  make  these  tendencies 
absorb  the  whole  of  the  presented  content  would  make  impossi- 
ble the  later  dualisms  of  thought,  while  to  make  the  presented 
object  the  determining  factor,  as  the  empirical  school  in  general 
did,  would  create  an  absolute  impasse  in  knowledge.  Both 
factors  are  present  and  operative  and  the  significance  of  the  first 
immediacy  is  that  it  represents  a  stage  of  experience  in  wliich 
these  two  aspects  of  all  thought  are  held  together.  It  is  a 
psychological  truism  to-day  that  nothing  can  be  in  conscious- 
ness except  what  consciousness  puts  in.  The  unity,  however, 
of  this  early  consciousness  is  not  a  unity  won  from  a  disturbed 
situation,  but  the  unity  of  a  consciousness  that  has  not  lost  its 
original  wholeness.  The  experience  is  one  in  which  there  are 
no  spheres  of  reference  and  control,  since  the  later  distinctions 
of  self  and  not-self,  and  inner  and  outer,  are  not  present.- 

From  such  interpretation  of  the  rise  of  consciousness  there 
can  arise  no  absolute  impasse  in  knowledge.  While  as  yet 
there  is  no  distinction  of  means  and  end,  of  interest  and  datum, 
it  is  nevertheless  true  that  the  afFective-conative  dispositions 
seize  and  determine  the  presented  content  in  congruitv  with 
themselves.  Whatever  conflicts  may  arise  between  these  two 
factors  in  this  primitive  experience  they  can  be  said  to  be 
resolved  by  the  processes  creating  them.  It  is  precisely  here 
that  we  are  to  seek  for  the  rise  of  the  aesthetic  experience,  whose 
function  in  the  development  of  thought  is  the  burden  of  the 
present  inquiry.  The  unity  of  the  first  immediacy  of  consci- 
ousness represents  the  merging  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought 
which  are  not  as  yet  distinguished  within  consciousness.  There 
is  no  justification  for  regarding  the  first  immediacy  of  con- 
sciousness as  absolutely  simple  in  character,  nor  for  identifying 
it  with  either  of  the  aspects  of  reflective  thought.  What  we  are 
to  assume  at  the  outset,  is  not  the  duality  of  subject  and  object, 


'  Prolegorrie-no  to  Ethics,  p.  48  (2d  ed.). 

'  R.  Adamson,  The  Development  oj  Modern  Philosophy,  \o\.  II,  p.  198. 


6  THE  AESTHETIC  F.XPERIES'CE. 

but  rnthcr  their  unity.  The  real  problem  here,  is  not  as  to  the 
character  of  the  dualism  of  the  pcrceiver  and  the  perceived,  but 
rather,  as  to  the  kind  of  unitv  that  precedes  them.  1  his 
unity,  from  the  present  point  o{'  view,  is  to  be  ref;;arded  as  the 
outcome  of  the  activity  of  the  perceivmg  subject  and  not  the 
unity  given  it  from  without,  which  is  the  error  of  the  dualistic 
theory  of  knowledge,  nor  wholly  made  bv  itself,  which  represents 
the  error  of  subjective  idealism.  Confessing  our  own  guilt  of 
the  'psychologist's  fallacy'  but  which  fallacy,  after  all,  becomes 
the  only  guide  of  the  metaphysician  (Ormond),  it  is  to  be  con- 
cluded, that  the  unity  of  the  first  immediacy  represents  a  unitv 
of  the  active,  constructive  processes  of  the  individual.'  The 
thing  perceived  is  the  content  of  the  act  of  perceiving,  while  the 
processes  of  perceiving  are  realized  in  the  thing  perceived.  1  he 
relation  between  the  two  factors  is  not  that  between  static 
entities,  each  fixed  and  complete,  but  a  relation  of 'togetherness' 
which,  from  a  higher  analytical  point  of  view,  represents  a  sort 
of  universalization  of  an  otherwise  heterogeneous  and  meaning- 
less content.  The  content  of  the  object  of  perception  thus 
becomes  a  related  content,  bur  in  this  early  stage  of  conscious 
development,  neither  the  object  nor  the  relationships  establish- 
ing it,  arc  distinguished.  The  content  of  perception,  when 
viewed  from  without,  consists  essentially  of  separable  and  dis- 
tinguishable units;  but  consciousness  in  irs  first  immediacy  gets 
no  such  separable  and  distinguishable  units,  but  things,  'pro- 
jects,' which  embody  the  unity  of  the  primitive  consciousness. 
Of  this  early  consciousness,  before  distinctions  arise  between 
content  and  control,  it  is  to  be  said  that,  it  acts  in  its  entirety 
upon  whatever  content  may  be  presented.  I  lure  is  as  yet  no 
manipulation  of  means  with  reference  to  a  particular  end,  since 
these  two  aspects  of  thought  are  nor  held  apart,  but  we  have 
rather  what  Professor  Ormond  calls  'spontaneity  of  will- 
efFort'  which  is  selective  and  constructive  without  prior  interest 
and  purpose.  Borrowing  Professor  Baldwins  formula  of  atten- 
tion, Attenrion  =  y^,  ci,  a,  (in  which  .7  srands  \\n  the  gross 
general  activities  of  the  attentive  process,  a  the  special  class  of 

'  Baldwin,  Mental  Developttunt,  p.  286  (lA  td."). 


THE  FIRST  IMMEDIACY.  7 

motor  reactions  attacliiiii;  to  classes  of  experiences  and  <t  tlie 
finer  adjustments  within  nV  it  is  at  once  to  be  seen  that  the 
attentive  processes  of  the  first  imiiiediacv  are  confined  lo  the  ele- 
ment A .  The  control  of  the  object  is  thus  direct  and  immediate, 
because  consciousness  being  a-duahstic,  the  process  of  deter- 
mination and  construction  of  the  object  is  a  self-contained  proc- 
ess. The  resulting  construction  thus  holds  true  of  the  whole 
ot  experience  and  represents,  therefore,  a  quasi-generah/a- 
tion.  This,  I  take  it,  is  precisely  what  Professor  Baldwin  has 
in  view  m  speaking  of  these  projective  constructions  as  'con- 
cepts of  the  first  degree'-  and  Royce  as  'vague  universals.'  All 
things  are  in  this  sense  universal  in  this  first  immediacy,  since  not 
only  is  there  no  distinction  between  content  and  control,  but 
even  the  content  functions  only  as  a  whole.  The  unity  of 
consciousness  within  this  early  stage  may  be  said  to  be  due  to 
the  fact  that  the  afFective-conative  tendencies  as  the  control 
factor  seize,  envelope  and  determine  the  situation  as  a  whole. 
The  resulting  construction  represents  a  'projectification'  of  con- 
sciousness in  all  that  it  can  apprehend.  Ihe  whole  of  whatever 
meaning  is  possible  to  consciousness  as  yet  a-dualistic  is  given 
adequate  rendering.  From  the  psychic  point  of  view  we  are 
to  regard  the  control  of  this  earh'  experience  as  being  'auto- 
nomic' in  character.  The  unity  thus  preserved  between  these 
two  factors  of  primitive  thought  is  rather  functional  in  char- 
acter, in  the  sense  that  the  self  is  not  distinguished  from  the 
inner  dispositional  processes,  thus  illustrating  the  general  con- 
clusion of  modern  psychology,  that  within  primitive  experience, 
motor  adjustment  is  the  measure  and  test  of  mental  unity. 

It  is  also  to  be  pointed  out  that,  within  this  first  immediacy 
of  consciousness,  the  distinction  of  individual  and  social  does 
notarise.  The  life  of  the  individual  is  largely  one  of  group  main- 
tenance, and  custom,  fixed  and  specific,  determines  conduct. 
Education  in  primitive  societies  is  largely  a  matter  of  handing 

'  Mental  Development,  pp.  i^i  ^. 

'See  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things, \'o\.  I.,  whose  terminology  is  followed 
in  the  present  discussion.  In  tlie  last  eilition  of  Menial  Drvelopment  (1906), 
Professor  Baldwin  applies  the  term  'Schematic  Generals'  to  these  first  projeaive 
constructions. 


8  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

down  traditions.  The  exclusiveness  of  primitive  society  and 
the  more  or  less  constancy  of  the  environment  supphcd  both  a 
common  content  and  common  control,  while  both  were  held  in 
an  undisturbed  unity.  Ihc  resulting  constructions  are  thus 
common  in  character,  but  since  the  aspect  of  commonness 
is  not  psychic  to  the  individual,  it  is  rather  to  be  regarded  as 
'aggregate.'  No  personality  as  such  attaches  to  the  con- 
structions of  this  early  experience  and  they  are,  therefore,  to  be 
regarded  as  anonymous  as  well  as  autonomous  and  collective  in 
character.  Thus  the  successful  construction  of  a  presented  con- 
tent makes  possible  communication  with  others  and  not  vice 
versa  as  the  Pragmatists  contend.  Moreover,  the  objectivity 
which  attaches  to  the  projects  of  the  first  immediacy,  is  not  the 
result  of  their  being  communicable  to  others,  but  rather,  they 
are  common  possessions  precisely  because  of  their  being  objec- 
tive. 

In  conclusion  it  is  to  be  said  that  the  significance  of  this  first 
immediacy  of  consciousness  is,  that  it  represents  a  stage  of 
mental  development,  in  which  the  several  aspects  of  thought, 
while  present  and  operative,  are  not  distinguished,  while  the 
projects,  as  the  resulting  constructions,  represent  attempts  at 
the  maintammg  of  the  equdibrmm  of  stmiulus  and  response, 
control  and  content,  by  reducing  all  presented  content  to  terms 
of  the  inner  dispositional  tendencies.  If,  therefore,  we  define 
experience  to  mean  the  essential  unity  of  subject  and  object, 
and  further  define  such  unity  as  the  ideal  toward  which  experi- 
ence moves,  it  becomes  evident  that,  in  this  first  immediacy, 
we  have  to  do  with  the  first  of  the  stages  in  this  development. 

W'ithm  the  first  immediacy,  however,  are  found  the  materials 
and  motives  of  its  own  polarization.  Characteristic  responses 
fail  to  bring  the  accustomed  satisfaction  and  situations  are  con- 
stantly arising  which  put  to  confusion  all  earlier  motor  accom- 
modations. Varied  experiences  witli  objects  already  familiar 
break  down  the  equilibrium  of  stimulus  and  response.  Thus 
while  the  object  remains  one,  responses  to  it  tend  to  multiply. 
The  child's  world  as  one  of  chance  and  change,  creates  at  once 
the  necessity  and  opportunity  of  rhougiit.  New  presentations 
gain  upon  the  indiMdual's  store  of  motor  adjustments.      Means 


Tilt:  FIRST  IMMEDIACr 


and  end  thus  tall  apart  in  consciousness  and  the  need  arises  of 
a  method  wherebA'  they  may  be  brought  together.  Interest, 
which  at  the  first  is  embodied  in  the  affective-conative  dispo- 
sitions ot  the  individual,  which  are  not  held  apart  in  con- 
sciousness from  the  presented  content,  may  make  either  <jf  these 
two  aspects  of  thought  its  objective,  so  that  we  have  what  Pro- 
fessor Baldwin  has  named  the  interest  of  habit  and  the  interest 
of  accommodation.'  Kach  represents  a  form  of  control  and  the 
operation  of  the  two  forms  of  control  in  the  presence  of  a  com- 
mon content,  constitutes  the  dualism,  whose  reconciliation 
becomes  the  problem  always  of  a  dualistic  experience.  I  he 
epistemological  problem  arises  only  with  the  dualizing  of  con- 
sciousness, and  its  solution  waits  upon  the  setting  up  of  a  com- 
plete experience,  which,  at  once  explains  and  completes  an 
experience  'otherwise  fragmentary — the  setting  up  of  a  whole 
which  is  not  conditioned  and  controlled  by  its  relations  to  other 
things,  but  is  determined  and  complete  within  itself. 

The  employment  of  images  to  meet  the  demands  of  situa- 
tions other  than  those  in  which  they  were  originally  given,  tends 
to  separate  the  images  from  the  process  in  which  they  are  con- 
tained. The  memory  image,  as  one  bearing  the  coefficients  of 
successful  conversion  back  into  the  original  experience,  becomes 
distinguished  from  the  images  of  fancy,  which  no  longer  possess 
conversion  value.  In  a  measure  it  is  to  be  said,  that  fancy 
represents  the  freedom  of  memory  run  riot;  it  is,  indeed,  what 
Amiel  has  called  it,  'La  dimanche  de  la  pensee.'  But  yet  it 
seeks  to  be  a-dualistic  since  while  memory  objects  have  no  exis- 
tence apart  from  immediate  consciousness  but  find  their  sphere 
of  reference  beyond  themselves,  the  images  of  fancy  represent, 
by  a  complete  removal  of  all  external  control,  a  return  to 
an  immediacy  of  consciousness.  No  distinction  is  made  in 
fancy  between  the  images  wholly  fugitive  and  fleeting,  that  is, 
wholly  detached  from  their  suggested  termini  or  end-states,  and 
the  treatment  given  them  in  consciousness.  .As  contrasted  with 
the  memory  images,  however,  the  dualism  of  inner  and  outer 
reference  maintains  itself. 

'  Baldwin,  Handbook  of  Psychology,  Feeling  and  ff'ill,  ch.  vii. 


10  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

The  significance  ot  the  fancy  consciousness  in  the  present 
connection  is,  that  it  represents  the  setting  up  of  a  world  in 
which  consciousness  can  move  freelv,  freed  from  the  hard  facts 
of  the  \\()rhl  of  sense-experience  and  the  hmitations  of  memory. 
Judged  m  the  hght  of  memory,  the  fancy  constructions  are 
worthless,  but  thev  nevertheless  possess  positive  value  in  sunder- 
ing the  two  aspects  of  thought  as  well  as  supplving  tractable 
material  upon  which  consciousness  can  exercise  its  dawning 
sense  of  agency  and  control. 

Hut  fancy  is  not  creative.  We  are  to  distinguish  between 
the  reproductive  imagination  and  the  imagination  proper. 
Ribot  fails  to  make  this  distinction  in  his  otherwise  valuable 
work  entitled,  Essay  on  the  Creative  Imagination.  In  a  general 
way  it  is  to  be  said,  that  fancy  represents  the  objectification  of 
consciousness  with  complete  spontaneity.  The  fancies  of  the 
individual,  like  the  unreflective  myths  of  his  primitive  ancestors, 
are  embodiments  of  an  a-dualistic  consciousness,  thus  compre- 
hensive and  for  the  time  sufficient  for  all  things.  "This,"  as 
SulK'  sa\'s,  "is  the  happ\'  age  of  childhood  when  a  new  and 
wondrous  world  created  by  a  lively  phantasy  (fancy)  rivals  in 
brightness,  in  distinctness  of  detail,  aye  in  brightness  too,  the 
nearest  spaces  of  the  world  on  which  the  bodily  eye  looks  out 
before  reflection  has  begun  to  draw  a  hard  dividing  line  between 
the  domain  of  historical  truth  and  fiction."' 

Thus  the  first  immediacy,  despite  its  apparent  all-sufficiency, 
carries  with  it  its  own  instability.  The  complete  swing  from 
memory  to  fancy  makes  necessary  a  return  movement.  Fancy 
errs  by  its  own  defect  and  possesses  contrast  value  only.  The 
complete  detachment  of  fancy,  however,  constitutes  it  a  world 
apart.  As  peculiarly  inner,  it  comes  to  have  a  persistence  and 
value  peculiar  to  itself.  Consciousness  is  now  beset  b)'  rival 
claims  and  the  evident  need  is  a  completed  experience  which 
finds  its  control  wholh'  wirliin  itself.  It  is  preciseh'  here  that 
the  epistemological  problem  arises  for  tiie  first  time,  which 
finds  its  solution  in  the  'semblant'  consciousness,  to  the  study  of 
which  the  next  chapter  is  given. 

'  Sully,  StuJifs  ni  Cl'iti/hnnJ,  p.  S2. 


CnAl'TI-R     11. 

The    St-cond    I irimcdtacy    or    'Senihlant'    Consciousness,    as    the 
Merging  of  Dualistic  or  MeJinie  Controls. 

From  the  standpoint  ot  reflective  thouglu,  the  development 
of  cognition  is  to  be  defined  as  an  increasing  determinnteness 
of  its  two  factors,  content  and  control.'  The  first  immediacy 
was  treated  in  the  preceding  chapter,  as  illustrating  a  mode  in 
the  development  of  cognition  in  which  the  two  aspects  of  thought, 
while  present  and  operative,  were  not  held  apart  in  conscious- 
ness. \\  ithin  such  mode  of  consciousness,  undetermined  pres- 
ence was  given  all  objects.  Presentation  and  determination, 
content  and  control,  interest  and  datum,  were  held  in  the  most 
perfect  equilibrium.  Reality  was  a  matter  of  pure  feeling, 
whde  the  attitude  of  consciousness  toward  the  object  constructed 
was  one  of  'presumption. '- 

Bur,  \\  ithin  the  first  immediacy  were  found  the  motives  and 
the  materials  of  its  own  polarization.  Making  the  stimulus, 
rather  than  the  response,  the  determining  factor  in  the  con- 
struction of  sense  objects,  it  is  to  be  said  further,  that  the  break- 
ing down  of  the  original  immediacy  was  due  to  the  presence  of 
changing  stimulations.  Memory  objects  are  valuable  onlv  in 
so  far  as  they  bring  sense  confirmation  and  dispositional  tenden- 
cies are  recognized  apart  from  their  accustomed  responses,  only 
when  they  fail  to  reach  their  accustomed  end-state.  I  he  pres- 
ence of  objects  which  resist  immediate  treatment,  as  well  as  the 
irregular  behavior  of  persons,  contribute  also  to  the  isolation 
of  the  inner  as  a  world  in  itself.  In  general  it  may  be  said  that 
the  presence  of  the  new  and  the  failure  of  the  old,  contribute  to 
the  sundering  of  the  two  aspects  of  knowledge,  which  until  now, 
were  held  in  an  equilibrium  more  or  less  stable.     Moreover,  the 

'Baldwin,   Thought  mi  J  Things,  Vol.  II,  hitr.;    iiprimcci  in  Psychological 
Revinc,  Vol.  XIII,  No.  6,  1906. 
'  Baldwin  (unpublished  lectures). 

II 


12  Tin:  AESTHETIC  EXPERIES'CE. 

individiiars  own  bodv  has  long  been  the  seat  of  certain  definite 
experiences  of  'storm  and  stress,'  which,  as  being  bevond  his 
immediate  control,  come  also  to  be  regarded  as  ambiguous. 
Thus  far  it  is  to  be  said  that  the  inner  is  such,  as  Professor  Bald- 
win has  pointed  out,  simplv  because  it  is  not  outer.'  I  he  out- 
come of  the  several  movements  already  indicated,  is  the  gradual 
formation  of  a  sphere  of  images  possessing  a  certain  stability 
and  character  of  its  own.  Unlike  memory,  however,  the  inner,  as 
such,  lacks  all  reference  beyond  itself  and  does  not  lead  to  any- 
thing beyond  the  process  in  wliicli  it  is  contained.^  As  thus 
separated  from  the  outer  as  held  in  the  net  of  memory  the  inner 
possesses  as  yet  only  the  characteristics  attaching  to  the  images 
lying  outside  the  established  forms  of  control. 

As  the  result  of  the  element  of  detachment  attaching  to  the 
memory  object,  both  memory  images  and  fancies  come  to  be 
regarded  as  inner,  in  the  sense  of  falling  within  the  body  of  the 
individual.  But  the  body  is  the  starting  place  of  the  child's 
life  of  exploration  and  discovery.  He  has  already  learned  that, 
by  manipulating  his  members  certain  satisfactions  are  to  be 
had.  The  child  early  imitates  and  strangely  enough,  as  Pro- 
fessor Baldwin  has  shown,  he  begins  by  imitating  persons.  By 
this  means,  what  was  at  first  projective  to  him  in  the  conduct  of 
persons,  comes  to  be  associated  with  his  own  inner  life.  Imita- 
tion thus  becomes  the  method  of  treatment  whereby  content 
hitherto  untrnctable  and  capricious  is  carried  over  into  the 
life  of  the  individual.  As  the  result  of  the  absorption  of  what 
was  at  the  first  outer  by  the  process  of  imitation,  the  inner  is 
no  longer  regarded  as  made  up  alone  of  images  that  have  lost 
all  positive  value,  but  is  now  recognized  as  being  w  hatever  lends 
itself  to  imitative  treatment.  Imitation,  which  is  at  first  organic 
in  character,  comes  to  be  applied  to  the  whole  inner  content  as 
detached  from  the  external,  and  comes  to  be  treated  with  reference 
to  the  fulfillment  of  inner  purpose.  It  is  evident,  that  with  this 
separation  of  the  images  as  content  available  tor  inner  treat- 
ment, apart  from  its  actual  control  in  the  outer,  and  with  the 


'  Thought  and  Thtns;s,  \'o\.  I,  pp.  90  sq. 
'Ibid. 


THE  SECOND  IMMEDIACY.  1 3 

adoption  ot  imitation  as  the  method  of  selection  and  reduction, 
knowledge  has  entered  upon  a  higher  mode  of  determination. 
Following  the  usage  of  Professor  Baldwin  we  shall  speak  of 
this  mode  as  the  'lower  semhlant'  in  which,  bv  the  merging  of 
two  sorts  of  control,  consciousness  regains  a  new  and  higher 
immediacy. 

The  Characteristics  of  the  Semhlant  Consciousness. 

The  works  of  Groos,*  Lloyd  Morgan-  and  Professor  Bald- 
win' in  connecting  the  aesthetic  with  the  play  consciousness,  have 
opened  a  new  epoch  in  the  study  of  aesthetics,  while  the  epist- 
emological  value  assigned  the  aesthetic  consciousness  in  Pro- 
fessor Baldwin's  Thought  and  Things,  supplies  an  adequate 
motive  of  aesthetic  construction.  The  conviction  is  general 
that  the  aesthetic  consciousness  has  not  arisen  to  satisfy  an 
already  existing  sense  of  the  beautiful.*  This  leaves  open  the 
question  of  the  motive  of  the  rise  of  the  aesthetic,  which  in  the 
present  essay,  is  found  within  the  general  problem  of  knowl- 
edge. 

It  is  quite  evident,  however,  that  the  role  assigned  the 
aesthetic  consciousness  in  the  development  of  knowledge,  depends 
wholly  upon  the  characteristics  found  attaching  to  it.  I  he 
conviction  has  long  held  that  play  is  in  some  way  a  natural 
phenomenon  of  the  mental  life  of  the  individual,  while  the  close- 
ness of  its  connection  with  art  has  been  explicitly  recognized 
since  Schiller.  We  are  not  concerned  with  its  biological  and 
psychological  value  in  the  present  discussion  but  rather  with  its 
epistemological  value  as  coming  in  between  the  image  and  the 
reflective  modes  of  consciousness,  and  thus  standing  mid-way 
between  the  first  immediacy  which  is  below  reflection  and  the 
higher  which  extends  above  it. 

According  to  Herr  Groos  the  several  theories  of  play  may  be 

'  The  Play  of  Animals  and  The  Play  0}  Man  (P-ng.  trans.). 
'  Animal  Behaviour. 

'  Soiial  and  Fjhutd  Intfrprftattons,  p.  I4S,  ff.,  etc. 

*  See  Tufts,  'I  he  (lenesis  of  thr  Aesthetic  Categories,  'Decennial  Publications 
of  the  University  of  Chicago,  Vol.  III. 


14  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

reduced  ro  two:  the  first,  datinfi;  back  to  Schiller  and  brought 
forward  in  more  recent  times  hv  Herbert  Spencer,  has  been 
most  ade(|uatelv  defined  by  Wallaschek.  "  The  surplus  vigor  in 
more  highlv  developed  organisms,  exceeding  what  is  required 
for  immediate  need,  in  which  play  of  all  kinds  takes  its  rise, 
manifesting  itself  bv  wav  of  imitation  or  repetition  of  all  efforts 
and  exertions  essential  to  the  support  of  the  organism."*  Play 
thus  arises  only  when  an  excess  store  of  energy  has  accrued  to 
the  organism  and  so  has  onlv  a  negative  value  to  the  organism, 
while  art,  as  associated  with  play,  comes  to  be  regarded  as  a 
useless  luxury — a  sort  of  by-product — possessing  no  direct 
utility  whatever  for  the  life  of  mind  or  body.  Professors 
Groos  and  Baldwin  have  pointed  out  certain  facts  that  tell  con- 
clusively against  the  'surplus-energy'  theory,  and  the  theory 
proposed  in  its  stead  corrects  the  limitations  of  the  former  theory 
and  exhibits  the  real  value  of  play.  Limiting  ourselves  in  the 
present  connection  to  the  epistemological  value  ot  play,  it  is 
said,  subject  to  further  elucidation,  that  the  individual  must  be 
playful  to  be  anything  more.  The  several  writers  on  the  sub- 
ject of  play  already  referred  to,  have  laid  stress  upon  play  as  a 
sort  of  practice  of  what  the  organism  already  has  tor  the  sake  of 
its  retention  and  advancement.  Professor  Baldwin  has  shown 
that  the  method  may  be  used  for  the  advancement  of  the  mental 
life  as  well  as  the  physical  and  social.  Ihe  several  characteris- 
tics of  the  semblant  or  play  consciousness  treated  in  the  present 
connection  are  selected  with  reference  to  the  emergence  of  the 
epistemological  consciousness  and  to  the  use  made  of  the 
aesthetic,  or  semblant  consciousness,  as  the  organ  of  imme- 
diacy through  a  merging  of  two  sorts  of  control. 

(/)   The  Content  of  the  Lower  Semblant  or  Play  Consciousness. 

The  inner-outer  dualism,  whose  reconciliation  becomes  the 
epistemological  problem  of  the  semblant  consciousness,  is  found  to 
be  a  dualism  falling  within  the  field  of  images.  Both  the  images 
of  fancy  and  the  images  f)f  memory  are  now  inner,  in  the  sense 
that  they  are  alike  materials  for  imitative  treatment.     To  this 

'  The  Origin  of  Music.     Quoted  by  Lloyd  .Morgan  in  .hiimal  Behaviour. 


THE  SECOXD  IMMEDIACY.  I  5 

entire  psychic  fielcl  the  inutan\c  method  is  apphttl,  \Mth  the 
result  that  the  two  types  of  images  are  redistrihuted  and  the 
images  of  fancy,  kicking  the  coefficients  of  memory  which  justify 
their  reference  to  a  determined  sphere,  retreat  again  into  the 
germinating  sphere  of  the  suhject  to  which  all  else  isobject.  The 
dualism  is  thus  between  two  classes  of  objects,  onlv  one  of  which 
finds  a  determined  sphere  of  reference  and  the  epistemological 
problem  is  the  erecting  of  a  sphere  of  reference  in  which  the  two 
types  of  images  are  unified.  Images,  as  Professor  Baldwin 
has  shown,  are  inner  only  because  they  are  not  outer.  Lacking 
the  coefficients  of  memory  which  justify  and  guarantee  whatever 
use  is  made  of  them,  the  images  of  fancy  are  not  available  for 
imitative  treatment.  They  lack  the  persistence  and  represent- 
ing character  attaching  to  the  memory  images  and  consequently 
have  no  reference  apart  from  the  process  in  which  they  occur. 
Having  thus  no  field  of  reference,  the  images  ot  tancy,  might, 
like  the  stream,  go  on  forever,  but  their  flow  would  be  aimless 
and  meaningless.  To  have  meaning  and  validity  there  must  be 
some  reference  to  a  sphere  of  determined  existence  in  which 
they  hold  true. 

But  only  that  which  already  possesses  some  determination 
as  holding  within  a  definite  sphere  of  existence  can  be  'sembled.' 
That  which  lacks  determination  altogether  is  not  imitable.  1  he 
defect  of  the  fancies  was  their  elusiveness.  They  err  by  defect.* 
But  the  images  of  memory  are  also  found  to  be  insufficient  in 
the  light  of  the  demands  of  an  increasing  experience.  From 
an  analytical  point  of  view  it  is  to  be  seen,  that  we  are  in  the 
presence  of  a  real  dualism  and  one  which  can  not  be  transcended 
by  ignoring  either  of  its  two  poles.  It  is  precisely  here  that  we 
are  to  find  the  value  and  function  of  the  semblant  consciousness 
as  the  organ  of  reconciliation  and  unity.  Since  memory  as  the 
sole  sphere  of  reference  and  control  has  proven  itself  limited,  in 
the  sense  that  it  can  not  meet  the  demands  of  changed  and  chang- 
ing experiences,  and  since  the  images  of  fancy  functioning  as  a 
demand  for  unity  and  congruity  have  no  field  of  reference  what- 
ever, a  fieldof  reference  must  be  established  in  which  the  demands 

'  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  I,  p.  90. 


i6  nn:  AtiyrHETic  f.xperiesce. 

alike  of  each  are  met  and  reconciled.  But  such  sphere  can  be 
erected  onlvas  a  projection  from  a  sphere  of  reference  and  control 
already  established,  hence  only  the  images  of  memory  as  held 
under  definite  coefficients  of  control  are  available  for  semblant 
construction.  A  further  meaning  is  to  he  reached  onK"  In'  a 
reading  forward  of  the  present  meaning,  which  is  at  once  the 
function  and  value  of  the  'sembling'  process.  The  absolute 
experience,  at  any  mode  of  its  genetic  development,  is  but  a  pro- 
jection of  whatever  meanings  consciousness  has  at  the  time  in 
question.  To  extend  experience  is  not  to  break  with  experience, 
and  if  reality  is  to  be  immediate,  it  must  needs  be  an  immediacy 
which  completes  and  merges  all  present  meanmgs  and  interests. 
To  limit  the  semblant  construction  to  the  images  of  fancy 
would  at  once  rob  it  of  all  variety  and  meaning  and  reduce  it  to 
a  sort  of  empty  immediacy,  of  which  illustrations  are  not  lacking 
in  the  history  of  epistemological  theory.  On  the  other  hand, 
to  limit  the  semblant  to  the  memory  images  alone,  would  yield 
only  a  world  of  discrete  and  quantitative  determination.  But 
by  an  inner  imitation  of  meanings  already  guaranteed,  both 
aspects  of  the  dualistic  experience  are  at  once  recognized  and 
reconciled.  The  semblant  consciousness  thus  stands  as  a  pro- 
test against  any  one-sided  procedure  and  meets  the  several 
demands  of  increasing  thought,  by  treating  meanings  already 
established  as  'schemata'  for  the  sake  of  further  meaning,  which 
while  not  as  vet  possessed,  is  nevertheless  treated  and  accepted 
as  already  established.  The  reality-feeling,  characteristic  of 
the  first  immediacy,  due  to  the  immediate  unity  of  the  two 
aspects  of  the  constructive  process  and  which  was  lost  in  the 
mediate  control  of  memory,  is  again  possessed  in  the  'make- 
believe'  character  of  the  semblant. 

(2)    The  Control  in  the  'Semblant'  Consciousness. 

Defining  x\u-  development  of  knowledge  as  the  increasing 
determinateness  of  its  two  aspects,  content  and  control,  the  sem- 
blant consciousness,  as  a  process  of  inner  imitation,  under  the 
urgency  of  purpose  selective  of  contents  already  established,  is 
to  be  regarded  as  the  first  appearance  of  a  relatively  free  sub- 


THE  SECOND  IMMEDIJCr.  I  7 

jective  control.  Within  the  Hrst  iininediacv  no  distinction  was 
made  between  these  two  aspects  of  thought  and  the  unity  is  to 
be  regarded  as  a  'projection'  embodying  the  affective-disposi- 
tional  tendencies.  Presentations  were  determined  wholh  in 
terms  of  what  consciousness  then  possessed.  From  the  vantage 
ground  of  reflection  it  is  to  be  said,  that  consciousness,  during 
its  first  immediacy,  defined  its  world  in  terms  of  undifferentiated 
feeling.'  It  is  further  to  be  said,  that  within  such  consciousness, 
the  emphasis  is  to  be  given  rather  to  the  subjective  aspect. 
From  the  standpoint  of  the  individual  the  process  is  'autonomic,' 
since  both  aspects  of  thought  are  as  yet  involved  in  a  jis\'chic 
whole,  whde  from  the  objective  point  of  view  the  process  is 
'foreign,'  in  the  sense  that  the  presented  object  is  the  determining 
factor  of  the  process.  These  two  factors  were  detached  in 
memory,  but  the  mediate  character  of  the  control  of  memory 
shows  that  consciousness  is  yet  a-dualistic.  Fancy  represented 
the  detachment  of  memory  become  complete,  in  that  a  complete 
break  was  made  with  the  outer  as  the  sense-datum.  In  the 
semblant  consciousness  there  is  a  return  to  the  outer,  as  held  in 
memory,  but  the  return  is  not  complete.  The  content  is  ac- 
cepted as  guaranteed  by  the  coefficients  of  memory,  while  the 
control  aspect  is  to  be  seen  in  the  fact,  that  the  images  an^  not 
used  for  the  sake  of  regaining  the  original  sense-control.  The  con- 
tent, thus  guaranteed,  is  used  for  the  sake  of  fulfillinginner  pur- 
poses and  thus  given  a  determination  which  it  does  not  have, 
but  which  its  control  coefficients  justify.  Consciousness,  for 
the  first  time  stands  apart  from  its  content  and  treats  it  with 
reference  to  its  own  purposes  and  demands.  The  semblant 
object  thus  represents  an  inner  construction  for  inner  purposes, 
but  out  of  materials  determined  in  earlier  modes.  It  is  neither 
a  fancy  object,  nor  a  transcript  of  the  outer  as  held  in  memory, 
but  rather  a  'prescript'  for  the  reconciliation  and  unification  of 
the  claims  alike  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought  now  present  and 
operative.  \n  fancy,  the  control  aspect  attaching  to  memory 
is  wholly  ignored  and  while  recognized  in  the  semblant  is  never- 


'  Professor  Baldwin's  'Reality-feeling.'  Sec  Handbook  of  Psychology:  Senses 
and  Intellect,  ch.  vii. 


1 8  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIES'CE. 

thclcss  lifted  from  its  regular  sphere  aiul  carried  into  another. 
The  content  accepted  as  a  'presumption'  in  the  first  immediacy 
is  now  carried  temporarilv  to  another  sphere  for  the  sake  of 
further  determination  and  made  an  'assumption,'  but  an 
assumption  justified  by  the  already  present 'presumption.''  As 
in  the  first  immediacy  the  determination  given  presented  con- 
tent was  regarded  as  an  attempt  upon  the  part  of  the  inner  dis- 
positional processes  to  reduce  the  presented  content  into  unity 
with  themselves,  so  the  semblant  object  is  to  be  looked  upon  as 
an  inner  control  of  content  wirli  reference  to  its  own  embodi- 
ment. In  the  presence  of  the  conflicting  claims  and  demands 
of  sense  and  memory,  the  semblant  object,  as  an  inner  deter- 
mination of  presented  content,  restores  unity  and  hence  imme- 
diacy of  consciousness,  by  merging  these  several  demands  into  a 
whole  that  at  once  transcends  and  completes  both  without 
ignoring  either. 

(j)   The  Immediacy  of  the  Semblant  Consciousness. 

A  third  aspect  of  the  semblant  consciousness  is  to  be  inferred 
from  the  attitude  of  consciousness  toward  the  object  thus  con- 
structed. IVimitive  consciousness  was  held  to  be  onlv  relatively 
simple,  and  its  immediacy  represented  an  equdibrium  of  the  as- 
pects of  knowledge  later  to  be  distinguished.  Ihe  determination 
given  was  found  to  be  the  issue  of  the  affective-volitional  tendencies 
and  represented  an  attempt  at  a  definition  of  the  world  in  terms 
of  feeling.-  In  the  semblant  consciousness  the  several  aspects 
of  thought  have  fallen  asunder  and  each  is  present  as  a  sort  of 
demand  peculiar  to  itself.  Kach  of  the  two  characteristics  of 
the  semblant  already  indicated  has  to  do  with  one  of  the  aspects 
respectively  of  the  inner-outer  dualism  of  the  semblant  con- 
sciousness. So  long  as  consciousness  remains  a-dualistic  the 
world  of  presented  content  is  taken  at  its  face  value  and  'things 
are  what  they   seem.'       Reality   is   solely   a    matter   of  feeling 

'  ILiKlwiii,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  II,  ili.ip.  i,  §4.  See  Henrand  Russell, 
Meiiiong's  '  1  heory  of  Compie.xes  and  Assumptions,'   MtnJ,  1904. 

'  Cf.,  Reality-feeling:  UMwin,  Handbook  of  Psychology;  Frcling  an  J  ff^iH, 
ch.  vii. 


THE  SECOXD  IMMEDIACY.  I9 

or  'presumption,''  Both  the  content  and  the  control  aspects 
were  placed  upon  the  same  basis  of  reahty.  Despite  the  detach- 
ment of  the  images  of  memor}'  and  their  use  as  possessing  con- 
version value  into  real  facts  of  the  outer  world,  the  aspect  of 
control  is  mediate,  in  the  sense  that  it  is  vested  in  a  content  King 
outside  the  control  process.  Fancies  came  and  went,  formed 
and  dissolved,  without  prior  interest  or  determination  upon  the 
part  of  consciousness.  As  a  result  no  distinction  was  made 
within  the  field  of  fancies.  But  with  the  isolation  of  the  inner 
as  material  available  for  imitative  treatment,  differences  at  once 
arise  within  the  sphere  of  images  between  those  that  have  outer 
reference  and  those  that  do  not.  The  latter,  as  a  sphere  of 
reference,  has  as  yet  only  negative  value,  being  made  up  of 
images  that  can  not  be  imitativelv  treated.  Every  image  is 
determined  as  belonging  to  either  one  of  these  two  spheres,  but 
can  not  hold  in  both.  In  either  case,  the  disposition  of  the 
images  is  through  a  mediational  content,  which  means  that  the 
old-time  immediacy  is  broken  down.  The  obvious  need  is  a 
sphere  of  reference  in  which  the  common  content  is  treated  with 
reference  to  the  demand  of  the  inner.  The  significance  of  the 
semblant  is,  that  by  merging  these  two  aspects  of  control,  it 
becomes  the  organ  of  a  new  and  higher  immediacv. 

The  semblant  consciousness  has  objectivity  as  the  first  imme- 
diacv also  had,  but  an  objectivity  secured  by  taking  over  into 
the  inner  the  outer  pole  of  the  inner-outer  dualism.  It  is  in  the 
the  semblant,  therefore,  that  we  are  to  find  the  first  instance  of  a 
real  transcendence  upon  the  part  of  consciousness,  bv  the  erec- 
tion of  a  schematic  object  in  which,  for  the  tmic,  its  several 
aspects  of  control  are  completely  harmonized.  1  hus  conscious- 
ness transcends  its  dualistic  experience  bv  erecting  an  object  in 
which  the  demand  of  the  inner  for  unity  and  of  the  outer  for 
consistencv  and  meaning  are  merged  in  a  new  mode  of  control, 
which  in  turn  becomes  the  organ  of  immediacy  of  the  two 
aspects  of  knowledge.  I  he  semblant  consciousness  is  imme- 
diate in  character,  an  experience  in  which  existence  and  content, 
interest  and  datum  are  merged  into  a  common  unity  of  reference 

'Ibid. 


20  THE  AF.STJIF.TIC.   F.XPFRIF.SCE. 

and  control.  In  the  case  of  the  first  ininiediacy,  such  unity  was 
secured  and  licld  in  the  absence  of  reflective  analysis  of  the  given 
into  its  characteristic  aspects.  In  other  terms,  the  first  immedi- 
acy represents  a  rendering  of  the  whole  of  consciousness,  in  its 
as  yet  unbroken  unitv,  while  of  the  semblant  consciousness,  it 
may  be  said  that,  it  represents  an  experience  in  which  the 
several  aspects  of  thought  are  again  merged  in  a  complete  and 
self-sustained  whole. 

{4)  'Syndoxic'  Character  of  Semblant  Constructions. 

The  three  aspects  of  the  semblant  consciousness  thus  far 
considered  will  later  be  found  to  be  precisely  the  three  criteria 
demanded  by  the  several  attempts  at  a  solution  of  the  epistemolog- 
ical  problem  of  reflective  thought,  as  well  as  the  three  aspects  of 
the  aesthetic  experience  par  excelletice.  But  there  is  another 
aspect  of  the  semblant  consciousness,  viz.,  its  'commonness,* 
which  is  also  a  characteristic  of  both  the  reflective  and  the 
aesthetic  experience.  Ir  has  already  been  pointed  out,  that 
the  'projective'  constructions  of  the  first  immediacy  were  'aggre- 
gate,' that  is,  common  to  the  group  but  not  recognized  as  such 
by  the  individual.  The  anonymous  character  of  the  unreflective 
myth  has  often  been  noted  but  not  as  yet  explained.  No  inquiry 
is  raised  as  to  the  author  of  mvths  and  fancies,  still  their  value 
is  not  lessened  in  finding  them  both  anonymous  and  collective. 

Professor  Baldwin  has  shown,  that  memory  shows  a  form  of 
*secondary'  conversion  which  is  essentially  social  in  character.* 
He  has  also  pointed  out  how  the  individual  in  play  comes  to 
submit  his  creations  to  others  for  confirmation.  The  material 
thus  entering  into  the  semblant  constructions  is  already  under 
social  guarantees  and  is  selected  because  of  its  common  charac- 
ter, while  the  images  of  fancy,  as  being  purely  private-  rein 
innerlich — are  at  one  relegated  to  the  limbo  of  the  illusory  and 
meaningless.  The  semblant  construction  thus  becomes  an 
object  for  general  acceptance.  It  carries  with  it  a  demand  for 
general  recognition.  It  is  precisely  here  that  we  are  to  seek  for 
the  aspect  of  "shareableness'  and  'universality'  which  attaches 

'  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  I.  p.  i^+fF. 


THE  SECOND  IMMEDIACY.  21 

to  play  and  art  alike.  \\  liile  the  play  object  may  be  recognized 
by  a  few  onh',  ir  nevertheless  carries  with  it  that  common  aspect 
which  makes  it  hold  tor  all  competent  observers.  The  objective 
character  of  the  semhlant  object,  like  the  projective  character 
of  the  myths  and  fancies  of  the  first  immediacy,  involves 
the  aspect  of  commonness.  It  is  precisely  here  that  we  are  to 
seek  for  the  normative  and  universal  character  of  the  semblant 
object. 

It  is  very  generally  recognized  in  present-day  aesthetic  dis- 
cussion, that  the  aesthetic  consciousness  has  arisen  from  motives 
other  than  a  pre-existing  love  of  beauty.  The  determination  of 
the  motives  from  whence  it  has  arisen  remains  as  yet  an  open 
problem.  Professor  Tufts,  of  the  University  of  Chicago,  holds 
that  we  are  to  seek  for  the  motives  of  the  aesthetic  in  the  held 
of  social  psychology.  But  Professor  Tufts  leaves  open  a  still 
larger  problem  as  to  what  makes  social  progress  and  intercourse 
possible.  In  the  present  discussion,  following  the  conclusions 
of  Professor  Baldwin,  thought  is  the  matter  of  the  social  process 
and  all  thought  is  necessarily  common.  Accepting  this  con- 
clusion, we  are  led  to  the  result,  that  the  motives  of  the  aesthetic 
consciousness  are  to  be  sought  in  epistemology  rather  than  soci- 
ology. At  the  several  stages  of  the  development  ot  the  epistem- 
ological  consciousness  the  demand  arises  for  an  object  which 
is  not  private,  but  which  appeals  to  all  members  of  the  commu- 
nity. Thus  we  found  that  the  fancies  and  myths  of  the  first 
immediacy  were  'aggregate'  and  non-individual.  With  the  rise 
of  the  inner-outer  dualism,  the  need  is  for  an  object  which  at 
once  meets  the  demands  of  the  individual  and  at  the  same  time 
demands  general  recognition.  At  each  successive  mode  of 
determination  of  thought,  the  purely  private  is  eliminated  and 
only  materials  under  the  test  of  secondary  conversion,  that  is, 
tested  by  means  of  others,  become  available  for  imitative  treat- 
ment.  The  problem  of  knowledge  thus  becomes  not  'Mow  can 
we  think  things  together,''  but  rather  how  can  we  manipulate 
an  already  common  content  for  the  effective  embodiment  of 
individual  meanings  and  purposes. 

'  James, 'ffow  can  wel  hink  Ihings  Together  ?' /'jv^/'o/o^/Va/ ^^•viru;,\'ol.  II, 
pp.  lOjfF. 


22  THE  J  ESTHETIC  EXPKRIES'CE. 

It  is  thus  seen  tliar  tlu-  characteristics  of  the  lower  semblant 
consciousness  are  precisely  those  denianded  by  the  cpisteniolog- 
ical  problem  of  the  inner-outer  dualism,  whence  the  conclusion, 
that  tile  two  have  arisen  together,  and  that  the  motives  and 
function  of  the  aesthetic  are  to  be  found  within  the  epistemo- 
logical.  By  merging  the  two  aspects  of  control  issuing  respec- 
tively from  the  inner  and  the  outer,  the  aesthetic  becomes  the 
organ  of  world-unity  and  world-interpretation.  The  projects 
of  the  first  immediacy  were  found  to  be  'synergetic'  while  the 
semblant  objects  are  to  be  defined  as 'syntelic' or 'contemplative.'' 
They  are  ideal,  in  the  sense  that  they  are  neither  pure  fancies 
and  thus  private  and  subjective,  nor  mere  transcripts  of  mem- 
ory, which  is  mediate  as  to  its  control,  but  rather  as  Professor 
Ormond  says  a  'prescript'  of  a  world  in  which  the  selective  and 
the  recognitive  are  reconciled. - 

The  semblant  object  therefore  reconciles  the  inner-outer 
dualism  bv  merging  the  two  sorts  of  control  issuing  respectively 
from  the  poles  of  the  dualism.  It  is  neither  inner  nor  outer, 
but  it  reconciles  and  satisfies  alike  the  demands  of  eacli.  1  he 
remote  control  of  memory  is,  for  the  time,  released.  1  he  con- 
trol of  the  semblant  construction  is  unique,  in  the  sense,  that  the 
material  entering  into  it  is  lifted,  as  it  were,  from  its  original 
control  and  used  for  personal  purposes.  The  object  thus  con- 
structed might  be  real  but  it  is  not,  though  treated  'as  if  it  were.' 
The  'autotelic'  character  of  the  control  of  the  constructions  of 
the  first  immediacy  was  found  in  the  fact  that  these  construc- 
tions represented  an  attempt  to  fashion  the  presented  world  in 
congruous  terms  but  without  conscious  separation  of  the  factors 
involved.  Interest  then  meant  the  whole  of  the  aftective-con- 
ative  dispositions.  But  with  the  bifurcation  of  consciousness, 
interest  may  be  directed  either  toward  the  content  as  held  in 
memory,  or  to  the  control  which  is  not  yet  able  to  function  in  its 
own  name.  But  the  very  fact  of  the  rise  of  the  semblant  object 
is  indicative  of  a  form  of  interest  which  does  not  terminate 
with  the  already  guaranteed  content  of  memory.      It  is  precisely 


'  Baldwin,  riipiil>lishctl  Lectures. 
'  FounJiitioris    of  K  tiouliJ(;i\  ch.  ix. 


THE  SECOND  IMMEDIACr.  23 

here  that  we  are  to  seek  tlic  rise  ot  tlic  scniblant  as  an  attempt 
upon  the  part  of  consciousness  to  give  expression  and  embodi- 
ment to  the  interest  which  gives  it  birth.  The  history  of  aes- 
thetics would  be  simply  the  history  of  the  rise  and  development 
of  this  sill  generis  type  of  interest.  The  several  historically 
recognized  art-periods  of  the  world  reflect  the  successive  stages 
of  the  embodiment  of  the  selt.  W  ithin  the  Hrst  immediacy 
there  is  to  be  found  whatVignoli  has  called  "the  objectification 
of  the  self  in  all  the  phenomena  it  can  perceive."'  Bur  in  the 
second  immediacy,  realized  in  the  semblant  consciousness,  there 
is  the  fusion  of  two  possible  controls.  Consciousness  is  now 
possessed  of  spheres  of  reference,  only  one  of  which,  memory, 
is  under  its  own  characteristic  coefficients  of  control.  From 
this  sphere  the  material  of  the  semblant  construction  is  drawn 
since  it  always  gets  its  materials  from  the  already  established. 
But  this  material,  as  already  established,  is  used  in  the  semblant 
consciousness  for  the  sake  of  a  more  complete  embodiment  ot 
the  self,  which  is  accomplished  by  the  self  giving  it  a  meaning  of 
its  own  and  not  one  guaranteed  through  something  else.  The 
'reality-feeling'  of  the  first  immediacy  which  is  lost  in  the  mediate 
character  of  memory,  is  again  reached  in  the  'make-believe' 
construction  of  the  semblant  construction.  The  self  becomes 
one  with  its  object  in  a  new  and  higher  immediacy.  By  a  pro- 
cess of  'Einfuhling,'  a  reading  of  itself  into  the  object,  it  com- 
pletes itself,  by  setting  up  an  experience  in  which  all  motives 
and  controls  are  merged.  The  external  world  as  held  in  memory 
is  held  up  and  treated  schematically  for  the  sake  of  further 
meaning.  The  aesthetic  experience,  at  whatever  stage  of  its 
development,  is  therefore  an  ideal  experience  in  the  sense  that 
it  does  not  mediate  the  original  control.  Its  meaning  is  an 
imported  meaning  and  comes  directly  rather  than  through  some- 
thing else.  1  he  control  of  the  construction  is  not  completely 
born  of  the  self  since  the  inner  is  yet  lacking  in  determination. 
The  semblant  consciousness  is,  therefore,  to  be  regarded  as 
quasi-epistemological  and  the  semblant  construction  in  which 
new  and  higher  immediacy  is  reached  as  quasi-aesthetic. 

'  Vignoli,  Science  and  Myth. 


CHAPTKR    III. 

The  Mediate  and  Dtialistic  Character  of  Reflective  Thought  as 

the  Outcome  of  the  Lower  Setnblant  and  the  Prelude  to 

the  Higher  Sernblant  or  Aesthetic  Consciousness. 

The  episteniological  consciousness  is  dualistic.^  To  know 
implies  and  involves  a  knower  as  well  as  something  known. 
Current  epistemological  discussion  recognizes  the  subject- 
object  dualism  as  the  fundamental  characteristic  of  thought. 
Intjuiry  as  to  the  origin,  nature  and  validity  of  knowledge  arise 
only  with  the  distinction  of  these  two  factors  involved  in  every 
conscious  construction.  Paulsen  is  justified  in  the  conclusion 
that  since  epistemological  discussion  arose  as  critical  inquiry 
upon  metaphysics,  it  arose  late  in  the  history  of  thought.-  But 
it  would  not  be  true  to  say  that  epistemological  inquiry  was  not 
present  at  a  much  earlier  date  than  Locke's  Essay  and  Kant's 
Critique  of  Pure  Reason.  It  is  neither  a  matter  of  chance, 
nor  arbitrary  procedure,  that  modern  philosophical  discussion 
has  gathered  about  epistemological,  rather  than  metaphysical 
inquiries.  Theory  of  knowing  rather  than  theory  of  being  is 
now  to  the  fore.  If  epistemological  inquiry  did  not  arise  as 
an  independent  discipline  until  the  latter  half  of  the  eighteenth 
centui} ,  It  was  not  due  to  an  absence  of  the  necessary  motives 
and  materials  at  an  earlier  period.  The  fact  rather  is,  that 
epistemological  inquiries  were  present  long  before  the  name, 
and  the  more  exact  statement  of  the  problem  of  knowledge  in 
modern  times,  represents  the  focusing  of  a  long  series  of  con- 
verging motives  and  materials  of  an  epistemological  character. 
Ihe  epistemological  consciousness  must  be  treated  genet- 
icallv  rather  than    transversely.^     It    arises   with    the    breaking 

'  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Yo\.  I,  p.  266,  ami  \(il.  1 1,  chaps,  xiii-xv; 
Hradltv,  A ppeoronce  ond  Realitx,  pp.  170,  1 75. 
'  i'aulscn,  Introduction  to  Philosophy,  p.  3jg. 
•  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  1,  p.  12. 

24 


THE  DUALISTIC  CHARACTER  OF  REFLECT I0\.  25 

down  of  the  first  immediacy  of  consciousness  and  its  problem 
becomes  the  erection  of  an  experience  in  which  the  (kial  charac- 
ter of  rliought  is  merged  and  a  higher  immediacy  estahhshed. 
In  the  preceding  chapter  it  was  shown,  that  the  sembhuit  or 
play  consciousness  represented  the  reconcihation  and  merging 
of  two  sorts  of  control.*  With  the  breaking  up  of  the  first  imme- 
diacy, in  which  content  and  control  were  held  in  a  relativelv  stable 
equilibrium,  memory  and  fancy  stood  for  two  possible  wavs  of 
treating  presented  content.  Interest,  at  first  identical  with  the 
affective-conative  dispositions,  and  unitary,  has  also  been  polar- 
ized, so  it  is  possible  to  speak  of  an  interest  of  a  selective  as  well 
as  interest  of  a  recognitive  character.  These  two  types  of 
interest  represent  two  possible  attitudes  of  consciousness  toward 
its  own  content.  The  significance  of  the  semblant  conscious- 
ness was  seen  in  the  fact,  that  it  represented  the  reconciliation 
of  these  two  forms  of  interest  by  setting  up  of  a  detached  and  self- 
controlled  construction. 

Before  the  rise  of  the  semblant,  as  an  inner  determination, 
the  inner  possessed  value  only  in  contrast  with  the  outer.  But 
the  semblant,  as  merging  both  memory  and  fancy,  is  neither 
a  memory  object,  nor  a  pure  fancy,  but  in  a  sense  both.  1  he 
rise  and  progressive  determination  of  the  semblant  supply  the 
materials  and  motives  of  the  substantive  dualism  of  reflection. 
The  sense  of  agency  and  control  found  present  in  the  semblant 
becomes  completely  generalized  for  all  content  and  functions 
as  the  presupposition  of  control.  The  quasi-logical  character 
of  the  control  of  the  lower  semblant  consciousness  was  found  in 
the  fact  that  the  constructive  self  was  still  identifieil  witli  a 
portion  of  its  content.  The  epistcmological  consciousness  is 
reached  only  when  the  self  as  subject  is  set  over  against  its  entire 
content. 

No  adequate  solution  of  the  epistcmological  problem  is 
possible  so  long  as  the  subject  is  identified  with  some  one  ot 
its  aspects.  With  the  rise  of  the  mode  of  reflection,  in  which 
the  self  is  set  over  ajrainst  the  whole  of  its  content,  a  content 
inclusive  of  mind  and  body,  each  under  its  own  form  of  control, 

*  Ibid.,  p.  119. 


26  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

the  epistemological  problem  becomes  the  reconcihng  of  a  dual- 
ism both  terms  of  which  are  equally  under  subjective  control. 
There  is  no  ground  whatever  for  makmg  either  mmd  or  body 
prior  in  the  solution  of  the  problem,  since  both  have  arisen 
together.  Either  apart  from  the  other  represents  an  abstraction 
and  reality  must  be  inclusive  of  both.  Any  form  of  interaction- 
ism  makes  the  problem  of  knowledge  insoluble,  while  a  paral- 
lelism of  the  type  that  forbids  all  reconciliation,  reduces  the 
epistemologist  to  the  same  extremity. 

In  the  preceding  chapters  the  attempt  was  made  to  show, 
that  the  earlier  dualistic  experiences  were  transcended  in  an 
imitative  treatment  by  consciousness  of  the  meanings  already 
acquired.  The  limitation  in  eacli  mstance  was  found  in  the 
fact  that  the  constructive  self  was  identified  with  one  term  of  the 
dualism.  The  semblant  consciousness  was  found  to  be  'pragma- 
tclic'  in  the  character  of  its  control,  because  the  materials  of  its 
construction  were  borrowed  from  memory.  The  outer  world, 
as  held  in  the  grasp  of  memory,  was  as  yet  the  sole  sphere  of 
reference  and  control.  But  witli  the  rise  of  the  subject-object 
dualism  of  reflection,  both  mind  and  body  are  equally  objects 
of  thouiiht  and  available  for  imitative  treatment.  From  the 
genetic  point  of  view,  therefore,  the  epistemological  problem  of 
reflection  can  be  solved  only  by  a  re-statement  of  the  subject-object 
dualism  for  common  reflection,  which  will  make  possible  the  trans- 
cending and  merging  of  the  subject-object  dualism.  This  requires 
the  same  process  as  that  by  which  the  earlier  dualisms  were  also 
transcended  and  merged. 

Reflective  thought  is  thus  dualistic,  since  the  dualism  of  sub- 
stances has  been  redistributed,  but  has  not  disappeared. 
Thought  has  still  to  do  with  two  opposed  spheres  with  character- 
istic forms  of  control,  the  one  constituting  the  content  and  the 
other  the  judging  self.  The  conflict  here  is  a  dualism  of  control, 
both  forms  of  w  hich  however,  are  mediated  through  a  common 
content,  and  the  solution  of  the  jMdblem  waits  upon  the  erection 
of  a  field  of  reference  and  control  in  wliicli  reality  is  given 
immediately,  rather  than  through  a  mediating  content,  the 
erection  of  an  'absolute  experience  in  whicii  phenomenal  dis- 


THE  DUALISTIC  CHARACTER  OF  REFLECTION.  27 

tinctions  are  merged,  a  whole  become  immediate  at  a  higher 
stage  without  losing  any  richness.'' 

(/)     Dualisttc  Character  of  the  Content  of  Reflection. 

Defining  judgment  as  the  acceptance  or  rejection  of  mate- 
rials determined  in  earlier  modes  of  cognition,  the  content 
of  the  logical  mode  may  be  said  to  be  whatever  the  mind  may 
think  about.  The  whole  content  of  e.xperience,  sense  objects, 
memory  objects,  semblant  objects,  and  even  fancy  objects  are 
alike  objects  of  thought  to  the  subject  which  is  now  set  (ner 
against  all  content  as  the  controlling,  directing  and  organ- 
izing factor  of  experience.  Self  in  this  sense  may  think  about 
everything  and  anything.-  But  the  content  of  thought  is 
mediate  in  character,  since  judgment,  as  the  redistribution  of 
earlier  meanings,  must  of  necessity  accept  its  content  as  held  under 
certain  presuppositions  of  control.  Whatever  the  objects  of 
thought  and  whatever  use  may  be  made  of  them,  the  control  of 
the  sphere  from  which  they  are  drawn  still  holds.  Judgment 
may  be  selective  but  is  selective  of  facts  only,  so  that  the  control 
of  the  judgmental  process  is  beyond  the  judging  self.  In  the 
Kantian  sense,  judgment  is,  therefore,  regulative  rather  than 
constitutive  of  experience.  It  is  precisely  here,  I  think,  that  we 
are  to  seek  for  the  limitation  generally  recognized  as  attaching 
to  thought.  Thought,  as  Bradley  says,  is  always  desiring 
another  than  itself,  because  its  content  is  always  in  an  incom- 
plete form,'  and  it  seeks  to  possess  in  its  object  that  whole 
character  of  which  it  already  owns  the  separate  features.  But 
since  such  a  complete  object  lies  beyond  thought,  it  must 
remain  forever  an  Other.* 

(2)   The  Dualistic  Control  of  Thought. 

The  content  of  the  logical  mode  thus  carries  with  it  certain 
determinations   due   to   its   having  a   certain   'make-up.'     The 

'  Bradley,  .-I ppearance  and  Reality^  p.  160. 
'  Dewey,  Studies  in  Logical  Theory,  pp.  I  and  2. 
'  Hradlcv,  .1  ppearance  and  Reality,  p.  1 80. 
Mbid..  p.  181. 


28  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

character  of  such  determination  reflects  the  stage  of  develop- 
ment which  the  constructive  consciousness  has  reached.  The 
aspect  of  control,  as  the  second  factor  of  conscious  construction, 
is  to  be  sought  for  in  the  process  by  which  presented  content  is 
referred  to  its  appropriate  sphere  of  existence  and  control.  The 
aspect  of  control,  therefore,  is,  in  the  logical  mode,  mediate  in 
the  sense  that  the  content  is  used  as  holding  within  a  certain 
sphere  of  reference.  1  rutii  as  the  outcome  of  the  logical  proc- 
ess means  preciselv  reference  to  a  sphere,  and  thus  involves 
something  to  which  it  is  true  as  well  as  some  one  to  whom  it  is 
true.'  But  in  judgment  these  two  are  never  the  same,  for  if 
they  were,  judgment  would  be  wholly  meaningless.  There  is, 
therefore,  a  real  dualism  present  in  judgment,  which  thought 
can  not  of  itself  transcend.  Mr.  Bradley  is  quite  right  in  sav- 
ing that  thought  can  not,  in  its  actual  processes  and  results, 
transcend  the  dualism  of  the  'that'  and  the  'what.'-  Thoujiht 
is  relational  and  discursive,  meaning  that  its  control  falls  outside 
the  subject,  so  that  B^adle^■,  and  the  Intellectualists  in  general, 
conclude  that  the  real  subject  of  judgment  is  reality,  that  is,  a 
fuller  experience  in  which  thought  is  absorbed,  the  predication 
of  a  content  consistent  with  and  in  entire  agreement  with  the 
self.  The  control  aspect  of  thought,  like  the  content  aspect, 
thus  points  for^vard  to  a  more  complete  experience,  in  which 
the  two  aspects  are  merged  and  completed.  But  this  represents 
the  epistemological  problem  of  reflective  experience. 

(5)   The  Subject  of  Thought. 

Withm  the  logical  mode  arises  the  distinction  between  the 
T  and  the  'me,'  the  thinker  and  the  things  thought.  In  our 
treatment  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought  known  as  content  and 
control,  we  found  that  both  alike  pointed  forward  to  an  aspect 
of  the  process  of  thought  that  was  not  fullv  rendered  in  either 
of  its  two  factors.  It  was  found  that  thought  as  such  was  unable 
to  get  its  materials  into  a  harmonious  system  or  to  establish  a 
control  in  which  the  subject,  as  the  existence  factor,  and  the 

'.Sec  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  11,  chap.  xiii. 
'  Hradky,  A ppearance  and  Reality,  ch.  xv. 


THE  DUALISTIC  CHARACTER  OF  RFFLECTIOX.  29 

predicate,  as  the  content  f:ictt)r,  were  iMoui^lu  togi-tlHr  witliin 
some  immediate  experience.  Asa  result  of  this  embarrassment 
between  subject  and  object,  the  Intellcctuahsts  identify  the  sub- 
ject of  judgment  with  reahty  as  such.  Mr.  Bradlev  has  shown 
that  the  thinking  self  can  not  be  identified  with  any  particular 
content.  Thought  thus  seems  always  to  he  unahle  to  render 
its  own  subject.  Mr.  Bradley  appreciates  this  fact  and  goes 
over  to  what  may  be  called  an  'a-logical'  experience,  meaning 
an  experience  in  which  subject  and  object  are  contained  in  an 
immediacy  of  feeling.'  What  Mr.  Bradley  among  the  Intellec- 
tualists  and  Professor  Royce  among  the  Voluntarists  are  search- 
ing after,  is  a  form  of  experience  in  which  rhe  self  is  able  to 
completely  embody  itself.  The  problem  becomes  the  further 
reading  of  present  meanings,  for  the  sake  of  fiirtlicr  meanings. 
The  function  of  thought  is  the  employment  of  already  estab- 
lished forms  of  control  for  the  sake  of  increase  of  knowledge; 
bur  rhe  problem  now  becomes  the  employment  of  already  guar- 
anteed meanings  for  the  sake  of  control  of  future  experience.^ 

The  epistemological  problem  thus  becomes  the  problem  of 
erecting  an  experience  in  which  all  partial  and  fragmentary 
meanings  are  made  complete  and  in  which  the  subject  finds 
itself  completely  reflected.  The  first  immediacy  was  main- 
tained by  the  self  objectifying  itself  in  all  the  phenomena  it  could 
perceive.  Without  the  distinction  of  subject  and  object,  con- 
sciousness nevertheless  maintained  its  primitive  unity  and  purity 
by  reducing  the  object  to  the  unity  of  pure  feeling.  In  the 
'make-believe'  character  of  the  semblant  consciousness  we 
found  the  merging  of  two  forms  of  control,  by  the  erection  of  an 
object  in  which  the  self  identified  itself  with  its  object.  It  is 
therefore  to  this  same  mode  of  conscious  construction  that  we 
are  to  turn  for  a  solution  of  the  dualistic  experience  of  reflective 
thought. 

Summing  up  the  discussion  thus  far  made,  it  is  found  that 
within  the  movements  of  the  logical  mode  we  have  found  two 

'  WtvuWc)',  A pptfirance  and  Rcalit\,^.  1 72. 

'See  Baldwin,  ■r/.'ott^/'^  and  Things,  Vol.  II,  ch.ip.  xiv,  who  distinguishes 
these  two  movements  as  'knowledge  through  control'  and  'control  through 
knowledge'  respectively. 


3° 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 


types  of  meanin<2;  which  were  not  onlv  not  rendered,  hut  for  the 
rendering  of  which  consciousness  within  the  logical  mode  was 
wholly  inadequate.  In  the  first  place  it  was  found  that  the 
thinking  self  could  not  be  rendered  in  terms  of  logical  thought 
and  thus  remains  over  as  an  rlcment  of  'intent.'  Logical  pro- 
cedure can  take  place  onl\'  witlun  a  related  content.  1  he 
thinker  thus  finds  himself  limited  to  .ind  conditioned  by  ihe 
material  with  which  he  works.  His  point  of  view  must  be 
retrospective  and  his  judgments  must  be  of  the  factual  type  only. 
The  personality  of  the  thinker  must  be  as  completely  lost  as  is 
possible.  Formal  logic  bv  the  use  of  a  series  of  wholly  neutral 
symbols  represents  an  attempt  to  eliminate  the  personal  element 
of  thought.  In  the  second  place  we  have  found  that  withm  the 
logical  mode  the  control  aspect  of  all  thinking  remains  also 
unrendered.  But  we  have  also  found  that  it  was  precisely  by 
this  means  that  thought  was  able  to  reconcile  conflicting  con- 
trols in  earlier  experiences  and  thus  reach  a  platform  for  higher 
mental  determinations  and  constructions.  1  he  projective  con- 
structions of  the  first  immediacy  were  regarded,  from  the  point 
of  view  of  the  consciousness  that  had  them,  as  'presumptions,' 
while  the  constructions  of  the  semblant  or  play  consciousness 
were  regarded  as  'assumptions.'  The  attitude  of  consciousness 
toward  the  first  type  of  constructions  has  been  characterized  as 
'primitive  credulity'  In  Bain  and  'reality-feeling'  by  Baldwin, 
meaning  a  sort  of  naive  acceptance  of  the  object.  In  the  case 
of  play  objects,  in  which  the  self  stands  apart  from  its  objective 
constructions,  there  is  a  sort  of  identification  of  the  self  \\  itli 
the  object,  an  acceptance  of  the  object  as  constructed  wholly 
for  inner,  personal  purposes.  Logic  is  not  a  matter  of  variable 
belief  and  every  precaution  is  taken  to  rule  out  this  aspect  of 
thought.  But  thus  far  we  have  seen  that  consciousness  has  been 
able  to  unify  itself  and  thus  reach  a  platform  for  higher  mental 
determination  only  by  a  reading  forwartl  ft  irs  present  store  of 
meanings  and  arraching  to  them  nuaiiings  which  they  are  not 
known  to  possess  bur  accepting  tiiem  ami  treating  them  as  if  they 
already  possessed  the  meanings  thus  attached  to  them.  Belief 
thus  passes  into  'faith,'  the  substance  of  things  held  as  pos- 
sible, the  acceptance  of  something  as  if  its  realit\'  were  already 
realized. 


THE  DIAUSTIC  CHARACTER  OF  REFLECT  10 S\  31 

In  addition  to  these  two  types  of  nieaninf^  which  the  logical 
mode  fails  to  render,  Professor  Baldwin  has  pointed  out  that  it 
fails  also  to  render  certain  'singular'  meanings.  He  points 
out,  what  is  a  matter  of  general  recognition,  that  the  singular 
judgment  has  been  a  sort  of  'thorn  in  the  Hesh'  to  the  logician 
and  the  philosopher  alike.  Traditional  logic  finds  itself  wholly 
unable  to  exhaust  this  type  ot  meaning  and  as  a  result  it  is 
identified    in   some  way   with   the   univt-rsal. 

The  fact  appears  to  be  that  there  are  two  types  of  singularity, 
which  Professor  Baldwin  has  named  'essential'  and  'imjK)rted' 
singularity,  only  the  latter  of  which  is  of  concern  in  rhe  present 
connection.  The  first  type  is  'rendered  only  in  community,'' 
whereas  the  second  gives  a  judgment  not  of  truth  but  of  descrip- 
tive assertion.  Its  singularity  is  a  matter  of  selection  and  appre- 
ciation, and  thus  can  not  be  rendered  in  logical  terms. - 

There  are  therefore  three  types  of  meaning  not  rendered  by 
the  developments  within  the  logical  mode.  Consciousness  is 
again  in  the  presence  of  a  dualistic  experience  and  the  epistem- 
ological  problem  of  reflection  becomes  the  problem  of  erecting 
a  whole  of  experience  in  which  these  several  meanings  are 
rendered. 

The  character  and  place  of  the  ontological  problem  deter- 
mine the  character  and  function  of  the  epistemological  and 
the  several  historic  types  of  reality  reflect  as  well  the  several 
types  of  epistemological  theory.  Professor  Baldwin'  has  ar- 
ranged those  several  types  of  theories  of  knowledge  under  two 
general  types  and  his  classification  is  here  followed.  Both  t\pes 
of  theory  which  he  knows  respectively  as  the  'Identity'  and  the 
'Representative'  are  found  to  proceed  from  ontological  necessity 
rather  than  psychological  analysis.  Kach  alike  assumes  the 
subject-object  dualism  as  the  necessary  presupposition  of  reflec- 
tive thought  and  each  also  attempts  to  transcend  the  dualism 

'  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  II.  chap,  xiv,  §8;  and  in  the  article 
'Logical  Communitv  and  the  Diffircncc  of  Discirniblcs,' P/vc/'o/ojf/.a/  Rn'inu, 
Nov.,  1907,  I'rof.  Baldwin  shows  that  it  is  only  by  generalizing  its  successive 
appearances  that  a  singular  object  can  be  made  matter  of  judgment. 

'  Baldwin,  loc.  cit.,Vol.  II,  chap,  xiv,  §4. 

'  Unpublished  Lectures. 


32  THE  AESTHETIC  F.XPERIESCE. 

thus  established   h\  estahhshing  some  sort  of  correspondence 
between  thoiio;ht  and  reality. 

The  Identity  theories  proceed  upon  the  assumption  that 
thought  and  its  object  can  not  be  foreign  to  each  other.  I  he 
object  of  thought  must  necessarily  be  the  product  of  thought. 
The  dualism  must  therefore  fall  within  the  process  which  is 
responsible  for  its  appearance.  Hut  since  consciousness  is 
recognized  as  three-sided,  we  are  to  expect  that  each  of  the 
aspects  of  consciousness  will  be  made  in  turn  the  organ  of 
knowledge  and  reality.  Accordingly  we  haye  with  us  Intel- 
lectualists,  Voluntarists,  and  Mystics  or  'AfFectiyists.'  By  neg- 
lecting the  e.xistence  aspect  of  thought,  the  representatives  of 
an  identity  theory  of  knowledge  reduce  thought  and  reality  to 
a  system  of  'implications.'  That  each  is  unable  to  carry  itself 
through,  is  to  be  inferred  from  the  fact  to  be  discussed  in  the 
following  chapter,  that  each,  in  the  end,  arrives  at  a  conception 
of  reality  in  terms  of  immediate  and  undifferentiated   feeling. 

The  value  of  the  identity  theory  resides  in  the  fact  that  it 
represents  an  attempt  to  preserve  and  restore  the  aesthetic 
and  religious  ideas  threatened  by  the  attempts  of  the  empiricists 
and  finally  destroyed  by  the  materialists.  But  because  the 
identity  theory  refuses  to  accept  any  object  as  an  item  of  knowl- 
edge which  can  not  be  e.xplained  by  analysis  of  the  subject, 
it  becomes  fixed  and  static  and  in  the  end  a  purely  formal 
discipline. 

The  representative  theory  of  knowledge  arises  through  a 
failure  of  the  former  type  of  theories  to  deal  adequately  with 
the  more  urgent  and  vital  matter  of  life  and  experience.  The 
rapid  development  of  empiricism  is  to  be  found  in  its  kee|Ting 
close  to  experience.  The  object  of  thought  must  be  other  than 
thought,  in  which  'other'  thought  must  find  both  its  motives 
and  sanctions.  But  in  either  type  of  theory  reality  is  given 
as  a  fixed  system  in  which,  according  to  the  Rationalists,  thought 
must  find  its  law  and  goal,  while  according  to  the  Empiricists, 
thought  is  true  only  in  so  far  as  it  adequately  represents  a  world 
already  organized  apart  from  the  knowing  mind 

But  as  in  the  time  of  Kant,  so  also  to-day,  the  conviction  is 
felt   that    these   two  types  of  theory  have-  run  themselves  out. 


THE  DUALISTIC  CHARACTER  OF  REFLECTIOX.  33 

1  lit-  tdct  thar  the  cliaiiipioMs  ot  ;in  iLltiuity  theory  ot  knowledge 
find  theinstlvcs  in  the  presence  of  ;in  itn passe  which  can  be 
bridged  only  by  a  denial  of  the  validit\  of  the  process  by  which 
it  is  established,  reveals  both  the  limitations  and  the  defects  of  the 
theory.  These  writers  proceed  upon  the  assumption  that  reality 
must  be  one  and  immediate,  but  since  thought  is  mediate  in  char- 
acter, reality  must,  in  the  end,  be  gotten  in  terms  of  pure  feeling. 
The  \V)luntarists  also  recognize  the  dualistic  character  of  the 
practical  lite,  bur  a  dualism  which  conduct,  as  such,  can  not 
transcend,  so  that  the  'other'  in  terms  of  which  the  self  completes 
itselt,  must  be  gotten  in  an  immediacy  of  the  will.  Thus  in  an 
indirect  way  the  outcome  of  the  rationalistic  movement  has 
been  to  arouse  and  ground  the  conviction  that  realitv  is  larger 
than  thought,  and  that  the  final  interpretation  and  unification 
of  experience  will  proceed  the  rather  from  the  affective-volitional 
aspect  of  consciousness. 

The  outcome  of  the  several  attempts  to  establish  a  represen- 
tative theor\'  of  knowledire  has  been  strikingly  similar  to  that  of 
the  former  type  of  theory.  Proceeding  from  an  inadecjuate 
notion  of  experience,  the  Pragmatists,  as  the  avowed  empiricists 
of  the  present  time,  find  the  highest  type  of  thought  and  reality 
in  undifferentiated  and  unrel^cctive  feeling.  The  plain  man  of 
the  street  who  does  not  think  but  knows,  represents  the  ideal 
type  of  thought.  Thought  arises  only  with  the  collapse  of  habit 
as  an  equilibrium  of  stimulus  and  response,  and  reality  means 
simply  its  successful  re-establishment.  The  upholder  of  the 
Identity  theory  of  knowledge  found  that  reality,  as  the  ultimate 
subject  of  thought,  fell  outside  the  process  of  thought.  The 
Kmpiricists,  on  the  contrary,  in  seeking  to  emphasize  the  control 
aspect  of  thought,  erred  in  making  the  empirical  occasion  the 
sole  cause  of  thouiiht.  Ihe  lesson  to  be  derived  from  the  failure 
of  each  of  these  two  types  of  epistemological  theory  is,  that 
thought  can  nf)t  bring  unity  and  completeness  into  its  content 
without  transcending  itselt.  The  epistemological  problem  thus 
becomes  the  problem  of  transcending  the  subjective.  Hut  the 
failure  alike  of  each  of  the  two  attempts  at  a  solution  of  the 
epistemological  problem  already  referred  to  forbids  any  further 
attempt  at  effecting  a  solution  at  the  expense  of  the  one  or  the 
other  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought. 


34  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

In  tilt  present  discussion  the  term  experience  is  used  as 
applying  only  to  consciousness  after  the  subject-object  dualism 
has  been  reached.  The  Rationalists  are  quite  right  in  holding 
that  experience  proper  connotes  conscious  relation  to  something, 
that  is,  the  distinction  of  object,  of  which  the  individual  is  con- 
scious, from  the  mind  which  is  conscious.  Such  experience  is, 
however,  only  of  gradual  attainment.  To  identify  experience 
with  the  first  immediacy,  in  which  thought  functions  as  a  self- 
contained  whole,  and  make  such  experience  the  type  of  the 
ultimate  experience,  means  to  reduce  the  highest  conceivable 
experience  to  undifferentiated  and  unrelated  feeling.  The 
Pragmatists  are  also  right  in  the  contention  that  thought  is  a 
function  within  experience,  if  reflective  thought  is  meant.  To 
identify  reality  with  an  immediacy  of  consciousness  can  mean 
only  that  reahty  is  the  highest  and  most  complete  type  of  experi- 
ence, 'an  immediate,  self-dependent,  all-inclusive  individual.'' 
Bradley  identifies  reality  with  the  Absolute  as  that  which  is  at 
once  without  distinctions  and  relations.  Still  later  he  identifies 
reality  with  'sheer  sentience' — a  sort  of  Nirvana  in  which  all  the 
attainments  of  thought  disappear  in  a  life-less  immediacy.  But 
to  reach  such  immediacy,  the  relational  side  of  thought  must  be 
merged,  since  reality  can  be  had  only  by  getting  a  'whole  which 
is  not  anything  but  sentient  experience.'^  It  is  precisely  here 
that  Bradle}'  differs  from  Green,  for  while  the  latter  would  make 
reality  a  matter  of  relations,  Bradley  would  make  relations  a 
sort  of  screen,  which  thought  throws  over  reality.  In  the  latter 
case  the  attaining  of  reality  means  the  undoing;  of  thought. 
Thus  the  'sheer  sentience'  of  Bradley  in  which  the  dualistic 
character  of  thought  is  overcome  is  an  a-logical  or  mystical 
experience — a  'consummation  of  thought  in  which  thought  is 
lost.' 

Professor  Royce  in  Tlw  JForld  and  the  Individual,  xt:ichGS  a 
quite  similar  conclusion  while  proceeding  from  the  more  active 
aspect  of  consciousness.  According  to  Professor  Royce,  reality 
is  that  in  which  the  ideas  find  their  complete  embodiment  and 


'  Bradley,  Appearance  and  Reality,  p.  1 79. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  173. 


THE  DUALISTIC  CHARACTER  OF  REFLECTIOX.  35 

meaning.  Every  idea,  he  continues,  is  as  well  an  act  of  volition 
as  of  cognition,  and  possesses  thus  two  meanings,  an  internal 
and  an  external,  the  latter  being  a  sort  of  projection  or  a  reading 
forward  of  the  former,  a  discounting  of  future  experience.  The 
external  meaning  as  the  'other'  is  that  which  the  internal  mean- 
ing seeks  for  its  own  realization.  \\  hat  is,  or  what  is  real,  is 
the  complete  embodiment  in  individual  form  and  in  Hnal  tulhl- 
ment  of  the  internal  meaning  of  finite  ideas.'  Truth  is  no 
longer  a  matter  of  identity  of  subject  and  object,  nor  a  more  or 
less  adequate  representation  of  an  external  order  of  things 
existing  either  in  the  mind  of  God  (Plato)  or  in  the  external 
world  (Hobbes),  but  the  conformity  of  an  idea  as  an  internal 
meaning  with  its  own  determined  external  meaning.  "No 
finite  idea  can  have  or  conform  to  any  object  save  what  its  own 
meaning  determines,  or  seek  any  meaning  or  truth  but  its  own 
meaning  and  truth."-  "This  final  embodiment  is  the  ultimate 
object,  and  the  only  genuine  object,  that  any  present  idea  seeks 
as  its  Other,"  In  a  word,  reality  thus  becomes  the  fulfilment 
of  purpose. 

"  By  thus  distinguishing  sharply  between  the  conscious  inter- 
nal meaning  of  an  idea  and  its  apparently  external  meaning, 
we  get  before  us"  says  Professor  Royce,  **an  important  way  of 
stating  the  problem  of  knowledge  or,  in  other  words,  the  prob- 
lem of  the  whole  relation  between  Idea  and  Being. "^ 

But  how  can  the  idea  as  a  cognitive  state,  possessing  only 
internal  meaning,  possess  itself  of  an  'other'  as  an  external 
meaning,  as  that  which  is  essential  to  its  own  completion  .' 
Bradley,  it  will  be  recalled,  was  confronted  with  the  same  prob- 
lem and  finding  that  thought  as  thought  is  not  able  to  grasp 
reality  sought  deliverance  in  an  ;i-logical  state  of  'sheer  sen- 
tience.' Professor  Royce,  on  riie  other  hand,  finding  that 
thought  can  not  of  itself  create  ideals,  since  it  has  to  do  with  the 
categories  of  the  true  and  the  false,  and  holding  that  reality  must 
necessarily  be  ideal  in  the  sense  of  n  more  complete  experience 


'  Rovce,  Thf  ff'orlJ  and  the  Individual,  p.  3  ^9. 
Mbi'd.,  p.  340. 
*  Ibid.,  p.  27. 


36  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

not  as  vet  realized,  fincls  in  rhe  inor::!  consciousness  the  postulate 
of  realitv. 

But  will  represents  also  a  ir.cdiatc  forni  of  experience. 
The  object  of  nioral  conduct  is  under  foreign  control,  in  the 
sense  that  its  value  is  not  in  itself,  Inir  in  the  end  not  as  yet 
attained.  Will,  therefore,  like  thought,  presupposes  a  reality 
which  transcends  it,  a  reality  which  it  is  forever  pursuing  but 
is  never  able  to  grasp.  Professor  Royce  seeks  to  avoid  the 
imfyasse  into  which  the  Inrellectualistic  position  led  him  at  an 
earlier  period  of  his  philosophic  thought,  by  making  reality  an 
act  of  will,  rather  than  an  act  of  thought.  "To  be  real,"  he 
says,  "means  to  express  in  a  final  and  determinate  form  the  whole 
meaning  and  purpose  of  a  system  of  ideas"* — "A  totum  sirtiul, 
— a  single,  endlessly  wealthy  experience."^ 

But  Professor  Royce  nowhere  points  out  the  method  by 
which  the  ideas  as  internal  meanings  are  able  to  project  a  farther 
experience  in  which  they  find  their  final  embodiment.  1  he 
'other,'  as  the  object  of  the  life  of  purpose,  can  not,  in  any  sense, 
be  foreign  to  the  self.  Bur  the  fact  remains  that  every  genuine 
act  of  will  is  actuated  In'  an  unrealized  idea,  hence  the  conclusion 
would  seem  to  follow.  rh:ir  volition  as  such,  can  find  no  place  in 
experience  in  which  the  aspects  of  existence  and  ideality,  of 
the  self  that  is  willing  and  the  object  willed,  are  once  for  all 
finally  united.  Professor  Royce  appreciates  the  dualistic  char- 
acter of  will,  as  well  as  the  unitary  character  of  reality,  and  in  the 
end  posits  an  immediacy  of  will  in  which  the  self  identifies  itself 
with  the  object  necessary  to  its  completion. 

For  both  the  Intellectualists  and  the  \'oluntarists  the  epistem- 
ological  problem  is  the  same,  the  problem  of  reaching  a  higher 
type  of  meaning  in  which  the  body  of  present  partial  and  frag- 
mentary meanings  are  explained  and  completed.  Lach  alike 
arrives  at  the  conclusion  that  realir\'  must  always  contain  a 
further  aspect  which  is  neither  thought  nor  wdl  anil  cm  not  be 
apprehended  luukr  the  form  of  eitlur.  Realir\-  therefore  can 
never  he  precisely  what  it  is  for  thought  or  wdl.      Neither  proc- 

'  Royce,  Thf  ff'orld  and  the  Individual,  \  ol.  1.  p.  545. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  546. 


THE  DlALlSriC  CHARACTER  OF  REFLECTION.  37 

ess  is  complete  in  itself,  whereas  realitv  must  he  an  individual, 
all-inclusive  whole.  Lackinii;  a  method  wherchy  consciousness 
can  reach  further  meaning  upon  the  hasis  of  meanings  already 
acquired,  both  Bradley  and  Royce  find  refuge  in  an  immediacy 
of  feeling.  But  to  reach  such  a  conclusion,  each  breaks  with  the 
principle  which  was  made  at  the  outset  the  explaining  principle 
of  the  mind  and  the  organ  of  realitv. 

In  the  preceding  chapters  it  has  been  shown  that  conscious- 
ness is  possessed  of  a  method  of  treatment  of  its  present  store  of 
meanings  whereby  it  mav  be  treated  with  reference  to  a  more 
complete  meaning.  Fhe  dualism  of  reflection  has  been  preceded 
by  earlier  dualistic  experiences  in  each  of  which  the  aesthetic 
arose  as  a  means  of  rendering  content  as  a  complete  whole. 
In  the  discussion  of  the  logical  mode  we  have  found  three  types 
of  meaning  left  over  after  thought  had  exhausted  itself,  hence  a 
dualism  remains  upon  our  hands.  Bradley  is  quite  right  in 
holding  that  thought  can  not  get  its  content  into  a  harmonious 
system. >  Volition  necessarily  carries  with  it  the  same  limitation. 
Truth  and  good  alike  are  under  mediate  control  and  are  general, 
whereas  reality  is  immediate  and  individual.  But  these  are 
precisely  the  characteristics  we  found  attaching  to  the  semblant 
consciousness  in  its  earlier  modes  and  to  it  we  are  to  return 
again  as  the  aesthetic  experience  par  excellence;  and  we  shall 
find,  upon  analysis,  that  it  arises  with  the  epistemological  con- 
sciousness as  the  necessar\-  organ  of  rendering  the  meanings 
that  have  not  been  rendered  in  the  logical  mode. 

*  Appearance  and  Reality,  p.  179. 


Chapter  IV. 

The   /^esthetic   Experience   as   a   H \per-loglcal   Mode   of   Con- 
sciousness in  which  the  Dualism  of  the  Logical 
Mode  IS  Overcome. 

in  the  preceding  chapter  it  was  pointed  out,  that  neither 
thought  nor  will  is  able  to  exhaust  experience.  In  both  types 
of  conscious  experience  there  is  found  to  be  something  more 
than  cither  thou2;ht  or  will.  In  cithcrinstance  reality  becomes 
that  which  satisfies  both  I'thought  and  will  and  both  the 
Intellectualists  and  the  Voluntarists  reached  the  common  con- 
clusion that  reality  is  an  immediate,  self-dependent  and  all- 
inclusive  individual.  But  since  such  type  of  experience  can  not 
be  reached  either  in  terms  of  thought,  or  of  conduct,  but  is,  never- 
theless, the  final  realization  of  both,  it  is  to  be  sought  for  in  an 
immediacy  which  is  the  rather  feeling  in  character.  Mr.  Brad- 
ley has  also  shown,  that  reality  can  not  be  regarded  as  a  mere 
identity  of  thouirht  and  will,  but  rather  the  goal  toward  which 
both  are  striving — an  experience  in  which  both  thought  and  will 
alike  are  present  not,  however,  formaliter  but  eminentur.^ 

Thus  it  is  to  be  concluded  from  the  outcome  of  the  intel- 
lectualistic  and  voluntaristic  discussions,  that  reality  must 
always  contain  a  further  aspect  which  is  neither  thought  nor 
will  and  which  can  not  be  fully  given  in  either.  Both  types 
of  epistemological  theory  reach  the  conclusion  that  thought  and 
will  are  general  and  mediate,  while  reality  is  individual  and 
immediate.  But  since  neither  thought  nor  will  can  establish  an 
experience  of  such  type,  both  must  yield  to  an  immediacy  of 
feelinc;,  which  as  beine;  rather  a-loc;ic;il,  in  the  instance  of  the 
Intellectualists  and  a-volitional,  in  the  instance  of  the  V^olun- 
tarists,  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  mystical  outcome. 

Current  epistemological  discussion  centers  about  the  prob- 
lem presented  by  the  dualism  of  mind  and  body  as  representing 

'  Sec  Bradley,  Appearance  and  Reality,  pp.  469-485. 

38 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HTPER-LOGICAL.  39 

two  antithetical  substances.  Accepting  this  duahsni  as  a  datum 
of  logical  experience,  the  attempt  is  made  to  bring  the  two 
together,  either  bv  reducing  the  one  to  the  otiier,  orby  Hndingsome 
third  entity  which  issues  in  the  two  aspects  of  mind  and  body, 
respectively.  To  accept  the  dualism  as  a  datum  of  logical 
experience  and  then  attempt  to  reach  a  solution  in'  reducing 
either  one  to  the  other  leaves  the  problem  unsolved,  while  the 
setting  up  of  some  tertmm  quid  solves  the  problem  by  a  sort  of 
'back-door'  method.  One  grows  tired  reading  that  mind  is  a 
form  of  matter,  or  that  matter  is  an  aspect  of  mind,  or  still 
further  that  the  universe  is  made  up  of  'mind-stuff."  lo 
materialize  the  spiritual,  or  spiritualize  the  material  rather 
pushes  the  problem  farther  back  than  reaches  a  solution.  The 
individual  is  neither  a  thinking  machine  wholly  impersonal  in 
character,  nor  the  creature  of  unreflective  instinct,  but  has 
become  conscious  of  himself  as  a  thinking  and  acting  personal- 
ity and  refuses  to  accept  any  solution  of  the  problem  of  knowl- 
edge in  which  these  two  aspects  of  his  nature  are  so  etherealized 
or  materialized  as  to  lose  whatever  of  vitality  and  value  they 
have  gained  in  the  development  of  thought.  The  individual 
having  become  conscious  of  himself  refuses  to  believe  either  in 
mutual  exclusion,  or  ultimate  antithesis  of  the  two  terms  of  the 
dualism.  Thought  has  reached  increased  determination,  not  by 
the  suppression  or  the  elimination  of  either  of  its  two  aspects, 
but  rather  bv  merging  both  in  a  higher  sphere  of  mental  deter- 
mination. 

In  the  first  two  chapters  above  the  attempt  was  made  to 
show  that  thought  reaches  a  higher  plane  of  construction 
through  an  imitative  treatment  of  its  present  store  of  meanings. 
The  aspect  of  unity,  what  Bradley  and  Royce  call  individuality, 
is  to  be  sought  for  on  the  side  of  the  controlling  self  rather  than 
of  the  controlled  content.  The  more  or  less  mystical  outcome  of 
the  epistemological  theories  of  Hradley  and  Royce  (mystical  in 
the  sense  of  affectivistic)  is  the  necessary  outcome  of  any 
attempt  to  solve  the  epistemological  problem  by  identifying  the 
self,  as  the  control  moment  of  thought,  with  any  one  of  its  sev- 
eral aspects.  Historically  speaking,  it  is  to  be  said  that  epistemo- 
logical discussion  has  completely  boxed  the  compass  in  that  each 


40  Till-  .lEsriitync  experie.\ce. 

(jf  the  several  aspects  of  developed  consciousness  h;is,  in  turn, 
been  made  the  explaining  principle  ot  the  mind  and  the  organ  of 
reality. 

Each  of  the  three  types  of  epistemological  theory  referred  to 
in  rile  preceding  paragraph  is  found  to  emphasize  some  one 
aspect  of  what  later  will  he  found  to  be  the  final  interpretation  of 
reality.  The  element  of  value  in  each  particular  theory  repre- 
sents also  the  limitations  of  the  remaining  types  of  theory.  A 
more  satisfactory  theory  of  reality  is  to  be  reached,  not  by  mak- 
ing a  sort  of  composite  picture  of  the  three  types  of  theory,  but 
rather  by  the  disco\ery  of  a  mode  of  conscious  determination 
in  which  the  several  claims  of  these  otherwise  partial  and  frag- 
mentary theories  are  met  and  merged. 

The  Intellectualists  maintained  and  snii  maintain,  that  the 
subject  and  object  must  be  identical.  "If"  says  Bosanquet, 
"the  object-matter  of  reality  lay  genuinely  outside  the  system 
of  thought,  not  our  analysis  onlw  bur  rhoucjht  itself,  would  be 
unable  to  lay  hold  of  reality."^  All  knowledge  is  a  product  of 
thought  in  that  it  represents  an  immanent  evolution  from  certain 
a  priori  principles  which  are  neither  derived  from  nor  verified 
by  experience.  Experience  is  from  one  end  to  the  other  a 
realization  of  a  spiritual  principle.  Ihoughr  can  not  exist 
apart  from  its  object,  nor  can  the  object  of  thought  exist  apart 
from  thought  for  which  it  is  object.  On  any  dualistic  theory  of 
knowledge,  truth  must  mean  some  kind  of  agreement  between 
opposed  factors,  which  while  opposed  come  into  some  sort  of 
relation.  This  relation  is  generally  spoken  of  as  the  reference  of 
ideas  to  a  reality  beyond  ideas. ^  1  he  reference,  however,  is  on 
the  side  of  the  knowing  subject,  while  it  also  carries  with  it  the 
conception  ot  a  real  which  always  remains  in  some  sense, 
external.  Bur,  the  Intellectualists  insist,  while  knowledge  refers 
to  reality,  reality  also  refers  to  knowledge,  that  is.  truth  is  a 
matter  of  accepted  reference  on  the  one  side  and  an  accurate 
reference  on  the  other.''     The  two  references  thus  always  concur, 


'  Bosanquet,  Logic,  Vol.  I,  p.  2. 

'  Cf.  liradlcy's  di-tinition  of  judgment,   Principles  of  Logic,  ch.  i. 

*  Sec  IJaillie,  Idealistic  Construction  of  Experience,  pp.  64. 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HrPER-LOCICAL.  4 1 

since  the  dualism  of  siihjccr  and  external  object  falls  within  the 
knowinp;  process  as  mode  of  conscious  acti\it\'.  The  distinc- 
tion of  subject  and  object  is  experience  broken  up  into  its  diver- 
sity 1  he  object  as  such  is  neither  external  nor  internal  for 
either  term  would  make  the  problem  of  knowledge  insoluble. 
The  dualism,  in  fact,  is  the  creation  of  experience  itself.  Such 
dualistic  experience  is,  however,  a  wound,  but  a  wound  of  con- 
sciousness' own  making  and  truth  represents  the  attempt  upon 
the  part  of  consciousness  to  heal  the  wound  homcEopathicalh.' 
The  ideal  experience  represents  that  mode  of  conscious  deter- 
mination in  whicii  tlie  mmd  as  the  subject  has  itself  as  a  whole 
consciously  before  it.  1  he  problem  of  knowledge  thus  becomes 
the  setting  up  of  the  ideal  experience  at  the  successive  stages  in 
the  development  of  thouglit  -a  problem  which  Ilegel,  the 
'Father  of  the  School,'  solved  in  terms  of  the  aesthetic,  while  his 
later  followers  find  the  solution  in  an  immediac\'  in  wJiich  the 
two  aspects  of  thouglit  are  brought  into  unitv.  The  point  of 
special  emphasis  in  the  present  connection  is,  that  the  Intellect- 
ualists  sought  to  harmonize  the  entire  content  of  thought  bv 
identifying  the  two  aspects  of  conscious  determination.  The 
object  of  knowledge  must,  therefore,  be  of  the  subject's  own 
construction,  in  which  the  subject  finds  itself  fulh'  realized. 

The  outcome  of  the  Intcllectualistic  movement  was  the 
setting  in  of  what  FlofFding  calls  'the  logical  ice-age,'  and  from 
which  \  oluntarism  represents  a  reaction.  It  at  once  occurs 
that  a  thorough-going  Intellectualism  rates  all  purpose  and  value 
low.  Following  the  Second  Critique  of  Kant,  the  \()luntarists 
make  the  will  the  primary  and  constitutive  function  of  con- 
sciousness and  reality  a  matter  of  will-acts  (  I  hathandlungen) 
rather  than  ideas.  thought  to  be  vital  and  valuable  must,  they 
hold,  be  selective  and  purposive,  and  both  these  aspects  of  con- 
scious experience  are  ignoretl  m  a  rationalistic  theory  of  knowl- 
edge. The  object  of  knowledge  to  be  real,  must  be  something 
more  than  an  object  already  identified  with  the  sidiject  in  cog- 
nition. The  object  of  knowledge  must  be  m  a  real  sense  an 
'Other.'     To  say  that  the  object  must  become  content  of  the 

'  Bradley,  Appearance  and  Reality^  p.  i66. 


42 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 


self  before  it  can  become  the  object  of  thought  makes  an  act  of 
will  an  emptv  procedure.  But  reality  is  larger  than  thought, 
and  back  of  thought  lies  a  deeper  part  of  the  self.  The  cate- 
gories of  the  will  are  more  potent  than  the  categories  of  thought. 
Reality  is  not  something  already  given  in  a  related  content  which 
onlv  awaits  further  analysis,  but  something  which  we  are  striving 
to  bring  into  being.  Furthermore,  reality  is  always  ideal,  in 
the  sense  that  it  represents  that  after  which  consciousness  is 
aspiring  in  order  to  clothe  itself  with  unity  and  completeness. 

The  real  significance  of  the  \'oluntaristic  movement  is  the 
emphasis  placed  upon  the  concrete  and  ethical  character  of 
thought.  I3y  their  insistence  upon  the  relational  and  discur- 
sive character  of  reflective  thought  to  the  complete  exclusion  of 
the  existential  import,  the  Intellectualists  reduced  thought  to  a 
wholly  formal  procedure  and  made  the  object  the  conclusion  of 
a  syllogistic  process.  But,  as  has  been  pointed  out  already, 
thouo^ht  is  never  able  to  render  harmoniously  its  own  content. 
The  meaning  which  connects  the  several  phases  of  thought  and 
adds  unity  to  the  process  as  a  whole  is  found  in  the-  ideal  of  a 
completely  individual  experience,  of  which  the  several  phases  ot 
thought  are  expressions.  There  can,  therefore,  be  no  real  prog- 
ress in  thought,  and  truth  and  fact  are  identical,  since  thought 
is  a  self-contained  process.  That,  however,  which  unifies  thought 
in  the  sense  of  organizing  and  holding  it  together  suggests  alike 
the  inadequacy  of  the  Intellectualists  and  the  starting  point 
of  the  Voluntarists. 

The  Voluntaristic  movement  represents  an  attempt  to  render 
the  'intent'  aspect  of  thought.  The  object  of  knowledge  as  that 
which  will  complete  an  otherwise  inharmonious  and  incomplete 
experience,  must  be  something  more  than  an  already  contained 
experience,  but  rather  that  which  calls  forth  efl^ort  for  its  posses- 
sion, and  in  the  possession  of  wliich  consciousness  experiences 
a  positive  widening  of  iis  active-emotional  life.  The  'other' 
of  thought,  as  Professor  Royce  has  pointed  out,  is  precisely  that 
which  thought  must  needs  have  for  its  own  complete  realization. 
The  object  of  thought  must  necessarily  be  beyond  thought's 
present  attainment  or  it  becomes  valueless  either  as  object  of 
thoucht  or  of  moral  endeavor. 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HrPER-LOGICAL. 


4i 


But  the  practical  life,  like  the  theoretical,  is  also  under  a 
mediate  form  of  control  and  the  moral  consciousness  can  no  more 
realize  its  inner,  organizing,  controlling  principle  than  can  the 
theoretical  consciousness.  Kach  alike  necessitates  an  ahsolute 
experience  which  is  neither  thought  nor  conduct,  hut  an  experi- 
ence of  an  individual  whole  in  which  horh  thought  and  voli- 
tion are  lost  in  a  higher  immediacy.  For  the  Intellectualists 
each  phase  of  thought  is  significant  and  finds  its  interpretation 
only  in  so  far  as  it  represents  a  reflection  of  a  higher  expe- 
rience. The  ideal  experience  would  he  that  in  which  the  sub- 
ject has  itself  as  a  whole  consciously  before  it,  or  as  Baillie  has 
expressed  it,  "it  would  be  the  form  of  knowledge  in  which  the  I 
object  is  the  mind  itself.  Bur  sucii  experience  is  the  condition  \ 
which  makes  knowledge  possible  at  any  stage  whatsoever,  and 
is  not  merely  the  goal  toward  which  the  several  modes  of  knowl- 
edge point,  but  the  very  principle  which  makes  them  what  thev 
are  for  finite  consciousness."'  Bur  the  problem  at  once  arises, 
the  epistemological  problem  par  excellence  for  the  Intellectual- 
ists, as  to  how^  any  particular  stage  of  experience  as  finite  and 
fragmentary,  can  reflect  a  more  complete  experience.  It  will 
be  recalled  that  Hegel  made  use  of  the  art-consciousness  as  a 
sort  of  mirror  in  which  rhc  ideal  experience  was  reflected,  while 
Bradley  and  Bosanquet  respectively  fall  back  upon  'sentient 
experience'  and  a  'pure  act  of  faith.'  The  \'oluntarists  are  con- 
fronted by  the  same  problem  as  to  how  present  finite  acts  of  will 
can  reflect  an  experience  in  which  the  life  of  will  is  fullv  realized — 
an  experience  of  'purposneness  without  purpose.'*  In  a  later 
chapter  it  is  shown  how  the  earlier  Voluntarists  like  Fichte  and 
Schopenhauer  made  use  of  the  aesthetic  consciousness  as  setting 
up  an  experience  in  which  the  active  life  finds  an  object  in  which 
all  its  aspirations  and  appreciations  are  fullv  reflected,  while  in 
our  day  Professor  Royce,  as  an  avowed  \ Oluntarist,  finds  the 
absolute  experience  in  a  'volitional  immediacy.'  Thus  it  is 
seen  that  while  the  epistemological  jMoblem  was  the  same  for 
these  two  types  of  epistemological  theory,  they  also  arrived  at 


'  Baillif,  IJc-alisttt-  Construction  oj  Esfxncme,  p.  85. 
'  Kant,  Krit.  d.  Urieilskraji,  p.  87. 


44 


Tin.  .il-.sTHF.TIC  FXPFRIEXCF. 


siiiiihir  solutions.  The  immediate  experience  embodied  in  an 
individual  form  represents  an  attempt  to  unity  and  thus  com- 
plete an  otherwise  mediate  and  incomplete  experience  by  setting 
up  an  experience  in  which  subject  and  object  are  completely 
merged  in  an  all-embracing  unity.  Thus,  the  true  and  the  good 
are  transcended  and  completed  in  a  whole  of  undifferentiated 
and  unrelated  feeling. 

The  character  of  the  absolute  experience  thus  reached  proves, 
however,  to  be  more  or  less  meaningless  and  empty,  since  it 
has  completely  broken  with  the  earlier  partial  meanings.  The 
subject  alike  in  thought  and  conduct  is  more  than  either.  Both 
demand  an  'other,'  and  such  'other'  constitutes  reality  only  in  so 
far  as  it  contains  what  at  once  puts  an  end  to  all  thinking  and 
willinii;.  But  in  attaining  this  'other'  both  thought  and  volition 
lose  their  essential  character.  Bradley  seeks  a  way  out  of  the 
difficulty  thus  presented  by  saying  that  the  'other'  which  thought 
is  always  seeking  but  which  remains  forever  beyond  thought  is 
its  own  completion.  "Thought,"  he  says  "can  form  the  idea 
of  an  apprehension,  something  like  feeling  in  directness,  which 
contains  all  the  character  sought  by  its  relational  efforts. 
Thought  can  understand  that,  to  reach  its  goal,  it  must  get 
beyond  relations,  ^'et  in  its  nature  it  can  find  no  working 
means  of  progress.  Hence  it  perceives  that  somehow  this  rela- 
tional side  of  its  nature  must  be  merged  and  must  include  some- 
how the  other  side.  Such  a  fusion  would  compel  thought  to  lose 
and  to  transcend  its  proper  self.^  And  the  nature  of  this  fusion 
thought  can  apprehend  in  vague  generality,  but  not  in  detail; 
and  it  can  see  the  reason  why  a  detailed  apprehension  is  impos- 
sible. Such  anticipated  self-transcendence  is  an  'other;'  but 
to  assert  that  'other'  is  not  a  self-contradiction."-'  Bur  lacking 
a  method  of  treating  thought  with  reference  to  its  own  advance- 
ment, Mr.  Bradley  in  the  end  sets  u]i  a  conception  of  reality 
which  is  a-logical  in  character.  I  he  'will-to-believe'  of  Pro- 
fessor James,  'the  pure  act  of  taith'  ot  Bosanquet  and  the 
'volitional    immediacy'  <^f    Royce,  are  to  be  regarded  also  as 

•  \\TdiA\Q\,  A ppearance  and  Reality,  pp.  l8l,  iSi. 
MbiJ..  p.  1S2. 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HIPER-LOGICAL.  45 

postulates  ot  reality  oi  an  a-l()ii;ieal  or  aft'ectivistic  character. 
With  both  types  of  theory  the  problem  becomes  the  construction 
of  a  single  whole  of  experience  under  some  mode  of  conscious 
construction  in  which  present  Hnite  meanings  find  themselves 
completeh'  unified  and  realized. 

In  the  preceding  chapters  the  attempt  has  been  made  to 
show  that  consciousness  is  possessed  of  such  a  method  whereby 
present  guaranteed  meanings  may  be  treated  with  reference  to 
further  meaning.  The  first  immediacy  was  found  to  represent 
a  single  whole  of  experience  due  to  the  fact  that  the  affective- 
conative  dispositions  seized  and  determined  the  whole  of  the 
presented  content.  The  resulting  unity  of  this  early  experience, 
embodied  m  the  'schematic  general,'  under  a  form  of  naive 
acceptance  as  an  act  of  'presumption,'  represents  in  germ 
the  two  aspects  of  all  thought,  which,  while  already  present  and 
operative,  have  not  been  distinguished.  Reality,  in  this  earlv  ^ 
undifferentiated  experience,  is  the  'projective  construction' 
which  represents  the  unity  of  the  object  in  perception.  The 
unity  of  the  thing  perceived  represents  the  unity  of  the  act  of 
perceiving,  or,  in  still  other  words,  the  unity  of  the  thing  per- 
ceived represents  a  specific  activity  of  the  perceiving  subject. 
The  unity  ot  the  projective  consciousness  is  not  given  in  the 
presented  content,  nor,  on  the  other  hand  is  it  wholly  made  by 
the  consciousness  that  has  it,  but  the  unitary  character  of  the 
first  immediacy,  represents  the  realization,  in  a  definite  form, 
ot  the  active-dispositional  tendencies  as  a  sort  of  embryonic 
self. 

The  significance  ot  the  'lower  semblant'  or  play  conscious- 
ness was  tound  in  the  tact  that  it  is  conscious  of  the  merging  of  the 
two  aspects  of  thought  which  were  not  held  apart  within  the 
first  immediacy.  Imitation,  as  a  method  of  manipulating  a 
guaranteed  content  with  reference  to  the  tulfilnunt  and  embodi- 
ment of  inner  purpose,  is  now  consciously  applied  to  whatever 
content  consciousness  has.  We  found  that  'semblant'  control 
was  not  direct  and  mediate  as  m  memory,  but  the  content 
guaranteed  in  memor\'  is  lifted  from  its  original  moorings  and 
used  with  reference  to  the  fulfilment  of  dispositional  tendencies. 
Play  thus  becomes  a  sort  of  self-contained  process  in   the  sense 


46  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

that  it  finds  its  end  in  the  process  itself.  It  is  indulged  for  its 
own  sake  and  hence  lacks  all  conscious  utilitarian  or  experi- 
mental value.  rhcre  is  complete  identification  of  the  player 
with  the  object  thus  constructed — a  reading-in,  as  it  were, 
of  the  person  of  the  player  into  the  object  thus  constructed.  As 
the  'projective'  construction  arises  in  an  undifferentiated  ex- 
perience, so  the  semblant  object  represents  an  object,  which 
wiiile  not  true  to  any  established  form  of  control,  is  nevertheless 
accepted  and  treated  'as  if  it  were'  real.  It  is  evident  that  we 
are  in  the  presence  of  an  wholly  new  form  of  control — a  control 
of  an  already  guaranteed  content  in  the  form  of  a  completed 
whole  of  content.  There  is  a  detachment  of  the  self  from  the 
stern  realities  of  real  life  whose  limitations  are  transcended  by 
the  erecting  of  an  experience,  not  as  yet  realized,  but  which  can 
nevertheless  be  treated  as  if  it  were  already  realized.  The  sem- 
blant construction  thus  becomes  a  personal,  all-inclusive,  self- 
contained  construction,  in  which  the  self  as  the  controlling  and 
organizing  principle  of  thought  reaches,  by  a  process  of  merg- 
ing and  unif^■ing  the  several  aspects  of  thought,  a  new  and 
higher  plane  of  mental  determination. 

Having  shown  that,  in  the  earlier  modes  of  consciousness 
the  aesthetic  and  the  epistcmological  arose  together,  and  that 
the  former  was  found  in  each  instance  to  possess  those  charac- 
teristics demanded  by  the  latter — whence  the  conclusion  that  the 
aesthetic  experience  functions  as  an  epistemological  postulate — 
it  now  remains  to  show  that  the  aesthetic  experience,  when  once 
reflective  thought  is  reached,  still  possesses  the  characteristics 
which  make  possible  a  solution  of  the  epistemological  problem 
of  reflective  thought.  Making  use  of  the  generally  recognized 
characteristics  of  the  aesthetic  experience  we  will  now  show  that 
the  aesthetic  experience  possesses  precisely  those  characteristics 
which  (jualify  it  to  render  the  three  types  of  meaning  which  the 
logical  mode  as  sucii  is  unable  to  render.' 


'  In  this  procedure,  and  in  the  results,  the  writer  is  foUowinp  IVofessor 
HaUlwin's  uii|>uhlisheil  lectures  in  which  he  has  presented  S(Miie  of  the  material 
of  the  third  volume  of  his  work  Thought  and  Things. 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HTPER-LOGICAL.  47 

(/)   The  Objectivity  of  the  Aestlietic  Experience. 

The  failure  alike  of  the  Rationahsts  aiul  rhc  Kinpiricists  to 
arrive  at  a  satisfactory  theory  of  knowledge  is  to  be  found  in  the 
fact  that  each  starts  with  an  assumption  which  lies  outside  the 
accepted  analysis  of  knowledge,  but  which  has  nevertheless  to 
be  admitted  nito  the  result  as  the  underlying  presupposition. 
Hegel  was  wholly  justified  in  describing  Kant's  theory  of  knowl- 
edge as  but  another  expression  of  Lockeanism.  Both  assume 
a  dualism  of  subject  and  object  which  must  somehow  be  main- 
tained. It  is  of  interest  to  note  in  passing,  that  the  correction  of 
each  took  an  idealistic  direction;  for  as  Berkleianism  represents 
an  attempt  to  remove  the  unknown  substratum  of  the  thing  sub- 
stance and  to  show  that  cognitive  experience  can  get  on  without 
it,  so  the  critical  successors  of  Kant  attempt  to  drop  the  'Ding- 
an-sich.'  For  both  Locke  and  Kant,  knowledge  must  find  its 
standard  beyond  itself  in  the  sense  that  reality  is  necessarily 
larger  than  thought.  This  same  position  is  reflected  in  the 
statement  of  Lotze  that  'reality  is  richer  than  thought'  and  in 
that  of  Bradley  that  'knowledge  is  unequal  to  reality,'  or  still 
again  in  the  statement  of  Kant  that  'beyond  the  bounds  of 
knowledge  there  is  a  sphere  of  faith.'  All  these  expressions  are 
based  upon  the  same  presupposition,  that  thought  implicates 
always  a  reality  beyond  itself.  Bur  it  at  once  appears  that  reality 
beyond  thought  is  not  only  unknowable  but  valueless;  for 
either  knowledge  determines  reality,  in  which  case  the  nature 
of  reality  falls  within  riu-  limits  of  thought,  or  tlurf  is,  from  the 
outset,  a  fundamental  cleavage  between  knowledge  and  reality 
which  can  never  be  healed  by  either.  The  significance  ot  the 
Intellectual  movement  is  to  be  sought  in  the  fundamental  pre- 
supposition that  knowledge  must,  in  some  way,  determine  its 
own  conditions,  that  is,  it  must  be  a  self-contained  experience. 

The  object  of  knowledge  can  be  neither  external  nor  inter- 
nal; it  is  not  the  product  of  interaction  between  subject  and 
object,  but  rather  a  unity  reflected  in  the  object  as  constructed 
within  consciousness.  The  'projects'  of  the  first  immediacy 
represented  a  unitary  experience  secured  and  held  in  terms  of 
'motor  synergy.'     While   within   this   early  consciousness   pro- 


48  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

ess  and  product  were  not  distinguished,  the  point  of  insistence 
was,  that  within  this  first  experience  we  found  the  condition 
wliich  was  to  make  real  and  possible  all  modes  of  knowledge 
whatsoever.  The  'projective'  experiences  of  this  early  con- 
sciousness were  neither  transcripts  of  the  outer  order  of  things 
nor  complete  determinations  of  presented  content  in  terms  ot  the 
affective-conative  tendencies,  Inir  represented  the  unity  of  the 
two  processes  functioning  as  yet   in   :iii  undisturbed  immediacy. 

In  the  'semblant'  consciousness,  the  resulting  object  in  which 
the  dualism  of  inner  and  outer  was  merged  was  shown  to  be 
clearly  a  matter  of  inner  determination.  The  value  of  the 
object  thus  constructed  was  found  to  consist,  not  in  its  reference 
to  the  object  as  such,  but  to  the  subject  that  determines  the 
object.  Ihe  object  is  one  in  which  the  subject  finds  himself 
reflected  and  enlarged.  If  we  were  to  define  the  ideal  experience 
as  that  in  which  the  subject  found  itself  fullv  reflected  and 
embodied,  it  is  evident  that  in  the  lower  semblant  construction 
we  have  at  least  a  type  and  an  illustration  of  such  experience. 
Taking  its  material  at  the  place  at  which  it  finds  it,  the  sei-.-iblant 
consciousness  erects  this  material  for  the  sake  ot  completmg 
itself  in  a  further  experience.  While  therefore  the  semblant 
object  is  not  an  object  held  in  memory,  neither  is  it  a  break  with 
memory  but  it  is  the  memory  object  lifted  from  its  guaranteed 
forms  of  control  and  used  for  the  sake  of  further  meaning. 
Thus  it  is  seen  that  both  in  the  early  immediacy,  in  which  there 
was  no  separation  of  the  two  factors  of  thought,  as  well  as  in  the 
second  immediacy,  in  which  the  two  factors  of  thought  were  dis- 
tinguished, consciousness  is  possessed  of  a  method  of  treating  its 
content  for  the  sake  of  advancing  its  own  meanings.  1  he 
resulting  object  in  each  mode  of  consciousness  represents  a 
merging  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought  in  a  construction  which 
becomes  a  platform  for  still  higher  conscious  determination. 

Bur  objectivity  is  a  universally  recognized  characteristic  ot 
the  aesthetic  experience.  Santayana  defines  beauty  as  pleasure 
objectified.'     Kaiu  uses  the  terms  'universality'  and  'necessity. '^ 


'  Santayana,  Thf  Setisf  of  Beauty,  pp.  44-49. 
'  K.int,  Kritic  der  Urteilskraft,  sec.  6. 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  UrPER-LOGICAL.  49 

Cohn  in  his  Allgftuetne  Aesthetiky  uses  the  term  'F'orderun^is- 
character,'  while  Volkelt  has  deHiied  tlie  objectivity  of  heauty 
as  due  to  the  'fusion  of  feehng  and  conteinphition.'  What  is 
meant  in  the  several  attempts  at  a  definition  of  aesthetic  ob- 
jectivity is,  that  the  aesthetic  object  and  the  consciousness  in 
which  it  arises  are  no  longer  held  apart.  The  self  becomes 
identified  with  the  object  as  peculiarly  its  own.  Thus  it  is  to 
be  said  that  the  self  that  could  not  be  rendered  in  terms  of  logical 
meaning  finds  in  the  aesthetic  experience  its  complete  rendering 
at  the  stage  of  development  thus  far  reached.  It  becomes  true, 
as  Professor  Baldwin  has  pointed  out,  that  the  aesthetic  reflects 
the  stages  in  the  development  of  the  self.  The  aesthetic  ob- 
ject is  therefore  not  an  external  object  as  the  Intellectualists 
well  saw,  but  only  a  farther  experience.  1  he  object  which 
they  attempt  to  set  up  represents  always  a  more  complete 
experience  in  which  the  self  as  the  thinker  would  complete  itself. 
But  lacking  a  method  whereby  consciousness  could  extend  its 
present  store  of  meanings  in  an  object  in  which  thought  finds 
its  limitations  transcended,  the  'ideas  of  the  reason'  of  Kant, 
the  'pure  act  of  faith'  of  Bosanquet  and  the  'sheer  sentience'  of 
Bradley,  become  empty  categories  in  the  sense  that  they  tell  us 
nothing  whatever  about  the  reality  beyond  thought.  To  say 
with  Kant  that  the  object  of  knowledge  represents  a  'possible 
experience'  is  meaningless  unless  there  is  some  point  of  contact 
with  the  actual,  for  possibility  can  only  be  determined  upon  a 
basis  of  what  is  already  real.  To  treat  a  thing  'as  if  it  were'  is 
possible  only  when  the  thing  as  a  further  experience  finds  ground- 
ing in  present  experience.  To  ask  'How  are  synthetic  judg- 
ments a  priori  possible,'  means  for  a  genetic  psychology,  'How 
can  thought  legitimately  refer  to  a  reality  beyond  itself.''  But 
it  will  occur  at  once  that  no  such  transcendent  object  can  be 
reached  by  a  process  of  analysis  of  thought-content.  It  is  pre- 
cisely here  that  we  are  to  seek  for  rhe  inadecjuacy  and  failure  of 
the  intellectualistic  programme.  "  1  he  Absolute  does  not 
want,"  says  Bradley,  "to  make  eyes  at  itself  in  a  mirror,  or, 
like  a  squirrel  in  a  cage,  to  revolve  the  circle  ot  its  own  perfec- 
tions.    Such    processes    must    Ik    dissolved    in    something   not 


50  THE  Al-STIIETIC  EM'ERIESCE. 

poorer  bur  richer  than  themselves."'  Hur  liow  can  thought  do 
so  ?  Bradle)'  himself  has  said,  that  if  'thought  becomes  other 
than  relational  and  discursive — that  is,  mediate  in  control, — 
it  brings  about  its  own  destruction;'-  while  it  has  been  shown  in 
the  preceding  chapter  that  there  are  meanings  present  in  reflec- 
tive thought  which  reflection  cannot  of  itself  render  .'  But  why 
limit  thought  to  the  movements  within  the  logical  mode  .'  May 
it  not  again  he  true,  as  Hegel  pointed  out,  that  the  wound 
occasioned  by  the  presence  of  a  dualistic  experience  has  been 
made  by  consciousness  which  is  also  able  to  heal  it  ?  And  did 
not  Hegel  show  remarkable  insight  in  holding  that  the  nature  of 
objectivity  depends  wholly  upon  the  way  in  which  experience  as 
a  whole  is  conceived  ?  Both  the  attempts  and  the  limitations  of 
the  Intellectualists  to  establish  the  objectivity  of  thought  as  a 
perfect  whole  of  experience,  lend  confirmation  to  the  assumption 
of  the  present  investigation,  that  the  aesthetic  experience  is  pre- 
cisely the  organ  of  this  sort  of  objectivity.  The  self,  as  the 
one  meaning  which  the  Intellectualists  admit  can  not  be  ex- 
pressed in  terms  of  thought,  once  again,  as  in  earlier  experiences, 
embodies  itself,  as  the  presupposition  of  control,  in  a  whole  of 
experience.  Objectivity  thus  becomes  the  unity  of  control  issu- 
ing from  the  individual  himself  upon  a  content  already  set  up. 
In  a  word,  objectivity  means  only  the  unity  of  all  experience  as 
such  and  such  unity  is  secured  in  termsof  the  aestheticexpenence. 
The  aesthetic  indeed  as  an  experience  in  which  the  sub- 
ject completely  embodies  itself  in  an  object  erected  under  its 
own  presuppositions  of  control,  an  experience  in  which  the  sub- 
ject identifies  itself  with  its  object,  indicates  not  the  completion 
of  the  process  of  thought  but  rather  makes  ready  and  possible  a 
new  and  higher  mode  of  mental  determination.  It  is,  ilicre- 
fore,  o  sign  that  thought  can  proceed.,  rather  than  a  sign  that  the 
work  of  thought  is  ended.  Ihe  latter  view  of  the  aesthetic 
experience,  which  is  admiral^K'  worked  out  b^•  Miss  Adams,"* 
would  reduce  the  aesthetic  experience  to  a  sort  of  epi-phenome- 
noii  of  smooth-working  thought.      It,  at  the  least,  reduces   the 

'  and  '  Uradky,  .'1  ppiarance  anJ  Reality,  cli.  xv. 

^  }^\\ss  t\i\7ixns,Thr  Aesthetic  Experience:  its  Meaning   in   a   Functional  Psy- 
chology, 1907. 


THE  AESTHETIC  .IS  HIPER-LOGICAL.  5 1 

beautiful  like  the  true  and  the  good  to  the  practical,  and  Miss 
Adams  wouKl  doubtless  sav  with  IVofessor  jauies  that  the 
beautiful  must  also  be  considered  as  a  good.  1  lie  outcome  of 
the  present  investigation,  however,  leads  to  the  conclusion  that, 
the  beautitul  has  a  value  and  tunction  of  its  own  in  experience 
and  that  instead  of  being  given  a  place  and  \alue  subordinate 
to  either  the  true  or  the  good,  it  is  rather  to  be  said  that  the  true 
and  the  good  are  such  onlv  because  they  are  also  moments  in 
the  larger  whole  of  the  beautiful.' 

According  to  Kant  the  object  of  knowledge  must  be  both 
universal  and  necessarv.  It  is  ot  historical  interest  to  observe 
that  he  found  these  two  characteristics  attaching  to  the  beauti- 
tul. Bain  also  notes  the  fact  that  the  beautiful  is  shareable. 
But  still  the  question  remains  as  ro  wlutlur  ob)ectivitv  lends 
universalit\'  and  necessity  or  whether  universalit\'  aiul  necessity 
lend  objectivity.  Professor  lufts,  in  his  article  entitled  'On 
the  Genesis  of  the  Aesthetic  Categories,'  attempts  to  show  that 
the  objectivity  attaching  to  the  beautiful  is  due  to  the  elimination 
of  the  subjective  and  private  and  the  setting  up  of  a  social 
standard  of  value,  so  that  his  solution  of  the  above  question  as 
to  the  priority  of  the  objective  or  the  universal  is  that  the  'uni- 
versalizing or  socializing'  of  the  standard  is  the  ground,  rather 
than  the  consequent,  of  the  objectifying.  Beauty  thus  becomes 
a  social  phenomenon  and  its  several  categories  are  to  be  sought 
for  in  social  situations  and  social  demands;  while  art,  instead  of 
being  the  embodiment  of  an  interest  sm  gcncriSy  has  arisen  to 
satisfy  other  motives  largely  of  a  social  character.  In  the 
present  discussion,  however,  reasons  have  been  found  for  regard- 
ing the  aesthetic  experience  as  a  sut  generis  experience,  whose 
function  is  to  be  sought  for  in  epistemology.  I  he  objectifying 
of  consciousness  has  been  found  to  be  a  matter  of  unifying  of 
consciousness  and  the  aesthetic  has  been  found  to  have  arisen 
as  the  organ  of  such  unification.  Within  the  first  immediacy, 
'motor  synergy'  was  found  to  be  tin  measure  and  test  of  mental 
unirv.  i  he  'projective  constructions,'  as  the  embodiments  of 
the  first  immediacy,  were  found  to  be  'objcctifications  of  con- 

'  Cf.  Baldwin,  Ftagmtnts  in  Philos.  and  Scitnct,  Introduction. 


52  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

sciousness  in  nil  rlu-  phenomena  perceived.'  Vhw  were  also 
found  to  he  'aggregate'  in  character,  that  is,  common  although 
not  so  to  the  constructing  consciousness.  Hut  the  point  in- 
sisted upon  in  the  present  connection  is,  that  they  were  aggre- 
gate in  reference  hecause  thev  were  'projective'  and  not  'pro- 
jective' because  thev  were  'aggregate.'  Likewise  plav  was 
found  to  be  'svndoxic'  and  not  private  in  character.  Flav  always 
involves  and  demands  an  audience.  The  material  that  becomes 
available  tor  pla\'  is  found  to  be  under  social  control.  Moreover, 
it  has  been  pointed  out,  that  plav  is  essentiallv  a  re-construction 
of  a  social  mdieu.  But  as  Professor  Baldwin  has  pointed  out, 
play  is  not  real,  in  the  sense  of  setting  up  an  actual  situation. 
Memory  is  present  as  a  sphere  of  reference  and  control,  but  the 
play  object  as  the  merging  of  two  sorts  of  control  represents  a 
detachment  from  an\'  exclusive  claim  that  either  form  of  control 
may  make.  The  interest  in  preserving  a  social  situation  is  pre- 
cisely the  interest  which  is  lacking.  The  fact  is  that  plav  never 
goes  over  to  real  life  and  is  not  indulged  in  for  the  sake  of  medi- 
ating real  life.  And  so  also  of  art.  To  make  art  social  means 
to  place  upon  the  aesthetic  experience  the  very  limitations  from 
which  it  is  seeking  to  free  itself.  Likewise  to  sav  that  art  must 
be  true,  in  the  sense  of  mediating  truth,  means  to  involve  art  in 
the  limitations  from  which  thouirht  is  seekins;,  through  the  art- 
consciousness,  to  free  itself.'  Ir  is  nor  true,  therefore,  as  Pro- 
fessor Tufts  holds,  that  objectivity,  as  characteristic  of  art, 
is  due  to  the  universality  of  the  experience,  but  rather  that  the 
universality  is  due  to  the  objectivitv  of  the  aesthetic  experience. 
'Common'  thought  alone  makes  socialization  possible  and 
objectification  gives  the  ground  and  possibility  of  universality. 
The  universality  and  the  necessity  which  the  Intellectualists 
sought  for  and  which  were  found  in  an  experience  in  which  thought 
with  irs  diialistic  limitations  and  implications  was  transcended, 
are  touml  among    the    generalh'    recogni/ed    characteristics    of 

•  Baldwin,  Unpublished  Lectures.  Professor  l^aldwin  holds  that  the  uni- 
versality of  art  conies  from  its  use  of  materials  already,  in  some  degree,  uni- 
versalized in  thouijlit,  and  reflects  the  degree  of  commonness  or  'social' 
meaning  of  the  material;  but  that  the  aesthetic  experience  as  such  is  not  social 
in  the  sense  that  it  lacks  anything  of  full  and  immediate  personal  appreciation. 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HVPER-LOGICAL.  53 

the  aesthetic  experience,  so  that  ir  can  he  coiickidcd  that  tlie 
demand  of  the  epistemological  problem  for  objectivity  is  suppHed 
in  the  aesthetic  experience, 

(2)   The  Aesthetic  Experience  as  a  Furthering  of  the  Self. 

It  has  already  been  pointed  out,  tliat  tlie  several  stages  m  the 
development  of  the  aesthetic  experience,  represent  and  reflect 
stages  in  the  development  ot  the  self,  as  the  contrcjl  factor  of  all 
mental  determination.  1  he  child  and  the  race  alike  project 
into  things,  including  persons,  the  experiences  passed  through 
in  connection  with  things.  Primitive  thought  is  animistic. 
Play  was  shown  to  be  the  setting  up  of  a  situation  in  which  the 
feeling  of  self  was  involved.  The  significance  of  pla\,  in  the 
development  of  the  individual,  was  seen  in  the  fact,  that  it  indi- 
cates the  isolation  of  the  two  aspects  of  thought  which  were 
held  tojiether  in  the  earlier  modes.  Professor  Baldwin  and 
others  have  characterized  this  aspect  of  play  as  'the  sense  of 
agency.'  The  point  of  interest  is,  that  the  play  object  is  one  set 
up  for  the  satisfaction  of  inner,  personal  purposes  and  indulged 
as  such.  As  a  semblant  object,  it  is  neither  memory  nor  fancy 
but  stands  as  an  object  in  whicli  both  are  merged  and  com- 
pleted. As  a  type  of  interest  it  finds  its  end-state  in  neither 
memory  nor  fancy  but  in  itself  as  a  detached  and  self-controlled 
meaning.  It  thus  represents  a  furthering  of  the  self,  as  the  pre- 
supposition of  control,  so  that  the  value  of  the  construction 
attaches  to  the  subject  rather  than  to  the  object  constructed. 

In  the  higher  aesthetic  experience  this  same  characteristic 
has  been  noted  and  described  by\'olkelt  as  the  "widening  of  our 
life  of  feeling  toward  the  typical,  the  comjirehensive  and  the 
universal."  This  characteristic  is  to  be  found  in  all  stages  of  the 
aesthetic  experience  as  attaching  t(^  the  subjective  aspect  of  the 
process.  It  is  treated  here,  not  only  because  it  is  a  generally 
recognized  characteristic  of  the  aesthetic  experience,  but  rather 
because  it  satisfies  the  demand  made  by  the  \  oluntaristic  type 
of  epistemological  theory  that  the  object  of  thought  shall  in 
some  way  represent  that  in  which  the  subject  finds  itself  enlarged 
and  realized.  Ihe  meaning  of  experience  is  not  to  be  found  in 
the  essential  identity  of  subject  and  object  but  in  an  'other'  in 


54  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

which  the  subject  finds  itself  furrhercd  and  completed.  The 
'other'  thus  becomes  a  deliverance  of  the  practical  rather  than 
the  theoretical  consciousness,  and  the  moral  consciousness  is 
made  the  postulate  of  an  all-comprehensive  and  individual 
experience.  Thought  not  being  able  to  encompass  the  object 
in  which  it  Hnds  itself  fully  reflected  and  its  limitations  overcome, 
seeks  deliverance  in  the  will.  Growth,  development,  implies 
struggle  and  struggle  implies  something  to  be  overcome,  so  that 
the  object  of  knowledge  is  posited  for  the  sake  of  moral  struggle 
and  perfection.  To  be  vital  and  fruitful  the  object  of  knowledge 
must  he  beyond  the  subject,  whose  attainment  of  the  object 
brings  the  e.xperience  of  an  enlarged  and  increased  self.  The 
Voluntarists  from  Fichte  to  Royce  emphasize  thus  the  control 
aspect  of  thought  rather  than  the  relational  aspect. 

But  will  is  also  found  to  be  dualistic  and  can,  no  more  than 
thought,  come  to  final  fulfilment.  Moral  struggle  always  involves 
a  struggle  between  existence  as  it  is  and  what  our  active  nature  is 
seeking  to  make  it.  It  is  precisely  this  dualism  that  Professor 
Royce  seeks  to  explain  in  terms  of  the  two-fold  meaning  of  ideas, 
the  internal  and  the  external.  The  epistemological  problem 
from  this  point  of  view  becomes  the  erection  of  an  object  as  a 
not-self  or  an  external  meaning  in  which  the  self  finds  itself 
revealed  and  realized.  The  earlier  rationalistic  position  of 
Professor  Royce  is  still  present  despite  the  more  voluntaristic 
statement  of  the  problem  of  knowledge.  The  external  meaning 
of  the  idea  is  a  necessity  inherent  in  the  nature  of  the  idea 
as  a  cognitive  state.  Experience  is  purposive  and  reality  can 
be  only  the  embodiment  of  a  single,  all-inclusive  purpose. 
Thought  is  barren  and  judgment  dead  unless  both  are  concerned 
with  the  more  concrete  matter  of  actual  experience.  ICvery 
idea  is  as  much  an  act  of  will  as  an  act  of  cognition  and  reality 
is  an  experience  m  which  purpose,  as  a  singular  meaning,  is 
embodied.  Will,  therefore,  like  thought,  presupposes  a  reality 
beyond  itself,  in  which  it  finds  its  partial  and  nucliate  meanings 
completed  in  the  all-embracing  immediacy  of  a  single  purpose. 

Bur  tin  \ Oluntarists,  like  the  Pragmatists  of  the  present,  by 
ignoring  the  relational  aspect  of  thought,  reduce  the  acts  of  will 
in  which  the  'other'  is  erected  to  a  sort  of  leap  in  the  dark.     \\  ill 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HTPER-LOGICAL.  55 

as  function,  nuist  liave  sonicthnig  to  work  with  .iv.d  upon,  and 
by  ignoring  the  content  aspect  of  thought,  the  control  aspect 
becomes  more  or  less  capricious  and  arbitrary.  Admitting  that 
thought  imphes  a  situation  in  which  the  two  aspects  of  knowl- 
edge have  fallen  apart,  the  question  remains  as  to  what  sets  up 
the  situation  that  makes  thought  possible  and  necessary.  The 
'other'  of  thought,  as  Royce  well  sees,  must  not  be  a  complete 
break  with  consciousness,/*/^/  must  be  a  meaning  for  the  con- 
sciousness ivhich  sets  it  up  as  an  'other.^  It  is  precisely  here  that 
the  position  of  Royce  is  the  more  fruitful  and  which  will  not 
permit  his  being  grouped  with  the  Pragmatists.  The  epistem- 
oiogical  problem  for  Royce  thus  becomes  the  setting  up,  by 
the  ideas  as  internal  meanings,  of  an  external  meaning  as  a  single, 
all-inclusive  whole  of  experience,  in  which  consciousness  is 
furthered  and  completed.  But  one  seeks  in  vain  for  even  an 
attempted  solution  of  the  problem  as  thus  stated.  The  Volun- 
tarist  and  the  Pragmatist  thus  find  the  limitations  which  they 
found  in  the  Intellectualistic  position  lying  at  their  own  door. 
Will,  like  thought,  can  complete  itself  only  by  becoming  what  is 
not  will.  Reality,  as  an  absolute  experience,  can  onlv  be  an 
experience  in  which  the  subject  is  one  with  its  object,  a  sort  of 
immediate  apprehension  in  which  the  dualistic  character  alike 
of  thought  and  will  is  merged  in  a  single,  harmonious  experience. 
Professor  Royce  reaches  therefore  the  conception  of  a  'volitional 
immediacy,'  which  being  an  essentially  a-volitional  experience 
must  be  regarded  along  with  the  'will-to-believe'  of  James  as 
a  sort  of  mystical  postulate. 

Professor  Royce's  position  represents  an  advance  over  the 
earlier  intellectualistic  position,  in  that  the  object  of  knoxuledge 
IS  necessarily  a  meaning  for  the  consciousness  that  has  it.  The 
dualism  thus  falls  within  experience  and  represents  a  dualism 
of  consciousness  toward  its  guaranteed  content,  rather  than  a 
datum  of  immediate  experience.  Hut  still  the  question  remains 
as  to  how  consciousness  can  erect  a  meaning  as  an  'other'  in 
which  it  finds  itself  furthered  without  breaking  with  its  store  of 
present  meanings  .'  Or  as  I^rofessor  Royce  himself  puts  the 
question  'How  can  the  subjective  transcend  itself.''  The  'other' 
of  thought  to  be  valuable,  must  be  neither  identical  with  the 


56  THE  .1  ESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

sub  jeer,  nor  a  coDiplcic  brciik  with  experience,  but  a  meaning 
external  only  in  the  sense  that  it  represents  a  further  but  never- 
theless possible  experience.  The  outcome  of  the  voluntaristic 
programme  is  identical  with  that  of  the  Intellectualistic  and  each 
alike  seeks  a  solution  in  an  immediate  experience,  which  must 
issue  from  the  experience  which  is  seeking  its  own  completion. 
In  the  case  of  the  Intellectualists,  it  was  shown  that  conscious- 
ness is  possessed  of  a  method  of  extending  its  present  guaranteed 
content  for  the  sake  of  embodying  the  interest  of  an  inner  and 
personal  sort  without  breaking  with  the  meanings  already 
acquired  by  thought;  so  it  now  remains  to  indicate  that  con- 
sciousness is  also  possessed  of  a  method  of  postulating  further 
meanings,  in  w  hich  the  present  limited  and  fragmentary  mean- 
ings are  merged  and  completed,  without  breaking  with  the 
values  already  acquired  in  consciousness. 

Professor  Baldwin  and  others  have  found  the  'self-exhibiting' 
activities  of  the  individual  to  be  involved  in  tlie  rise  of  the  aes- 
thetic experience.  I  he  burden  of  the  present  discussion  has 
been  that  the  aesthetic  in  the  several  stages  of  its  development 
reflects  the  development  of  the  self.  Plav  was  shown  to  be 
always  the  setting  up  of  a  situation  of  a  personal  sort.  The 
limitations  of  the  play  mode  are  to  be  found  in  the  material  held 
in  consciousness  under  its  own  coefficients  of  control;  this 
determines  and  limits  the  possible  construction  which  conscious- 
ness can  make  of  it.  As  between  memory  under  the  most  rigid 
control  as  representing  an  external  order  of  things  and  fancy  as 
wholly  detached  content,  play  as  an  essentially  inner  construc- 
tion was  neither  and  yet  satisfied  the  demands  of  both.  The 
motive  of  the  play-construction  is  a  motive  sui  generis  and  to 
reduce  play  to  work  would  mean  to  destroy  the  essential  charac- 
ter of  play.  The  object  thus  constructed,  while  not  real  if 
tested  only  by  memory,  is  nevertheless  accepted  as  if  it  were  real. 
1  he  'reality-feeling'  of  the  projective  consciousness,  reflecting 
the  unity  of  subject  and  object  as  the  two  factors  of  all  mental 
construction — whichunity  was  broken  down  by  the  mediate  char- 
acter of  the  control  of  memory — is  once  more  secured  In  the 
playful  setting  up  of  a  'make-believe' object  as  the 'assumption' of 
still  farther  meaning.      The  hmitationof  the  lower  semblanr  con- 


57 

struction  is  to  be  sought  in  the  material  avaihihle  for  such  treat- 
ment. Onlv  when  the  logical  mode  is  reached  do  tlic  two  types 
of  meaning,  with  one  or  the  other  of  which  the  self  as  control 
factor  has  been  identified,  become  the  content  of  the  self  as  the 
presupposition  of  control.  The  failure  of  the  Intellectualists  to 
deal  adequateh'  with  the  epistemological  problem  is  to  be  found 
in  the  assumed  identity  of  the  self  and  its  related  content.  The 
Voluntarists  on  the  other  hand  identify  the  self  with  the  practical 
will.  But  both  thought  and  will  were  found  to  be  dualistic  in 
character,  so  that  the  self  could  never  embody  itself  fully  and 
immediately  in  either.  Both  alike  reached  the  conclusion  that 
reality  must  be  some  form  of  immediacy  of  consciousness,  as  a 
sort  of  hyper-e.xperience  in  which  both  thought  and  will  are 
realized  in  an  object  which  is  neither  e.\clusivel\'.  But  tiie 
aesthetic  experience  as  a  h\'per-logical  mode  of  conscious  de- 
termination is  found  to  be  possessed  ot  a  method  ot  manipu- 
lating both  types  of  meaning  with  reference  to  their  being 
brought  together  under  the  presupposition  ot  a  control  issuing 
from  within.  The  object  thus  constructed  under  the  presuppo- 
sition of  inner  control,  is  accepted  as  meeting  the  demands  alike 
of  rlu-  life  of  thought  and  will,  without  being  held  under  the 
mediate  form  of  control  of  either,  but  at  the  same  time  standing 
for  a  type  of  mental  determination  in  which  both  are  advanced 
without  breaking  w  irji  the  meanings  already  acquired. 

Defining  the  developmentof  cognition  as  a  seriesof  determina- 
tions of  the  two  aspects  of  thought,  the  attempt  has  been  made 
to  show  that  consciousness  has  from  the  outset  advanced  trom 
one  mode  of  determination  to  another  only  by  a  process  of  advan- 
cing the  meanings  already  acquired  under  definite  forms  of  con- 
trol. The  object  which  made  thought  possible  and  fruitful  at 
each  of  the  successive  modes  of  mental  determination  now  falls 
wholly  within  experience  without  at  the  same  time  being  a  mere 
duplicate  of  an  already  acquired  meaning.  1  he  unity  of  sub- 
ject and  object  implied  in  all  knowledge  is  the  unity  of  the  self 
acquired  through  an  imitative  treatment  of  its  present  supply 
of  meanings.  The  resulting  identity  thus  becomes  a  matter  of 
acceptance,  of  belief,  rather  than  an  analysis  of  present  content. 
The  object  is  a  semblant  construction  erected  for  inner,  personal 


58  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

purposes  and  whollv  under  inner  determination.  The  identity 
of  subject  and  object,  which  the  Intellectuahsts  were  in  search 
of  is  to  be  soufjht  in  aesthetic  experience  which  permeates 
consciousness  as  a  whole  rather  than  in  some  Absolute,  which 
lies,  as  it  were,  be\ond  the  process  of  mental  determination  and 
operates  upon  it  from  without.  But  because  the  object  is  thus 
erected  as  havinc;  further  meaning  and  thus  serving  to  unify 
and  complete  all  partial  controls  and  meanings,  it  is  also  an 
object  not  as  yet  possessed;  and  hence  it  functions  as  an  'other* 
thus  meeting  the  demands  of  the  Voluntarists.  Thus  the  self> 
which  the  Intellectuahsts  identified  with  related  content  and  the 
Voluntarists  with  the  practical  reason,  but  which  as  a  meaning 
could  not  be  rendered  in  terms  of  either,  becoming  detached  from 
both  types  of  meant  tig,  restates  both  for  common  reflection,  and 
transcends  the  dualistic  experience  due  to  the  presence  and  func- 
tioning of  the  two  antipodal  methods  of  control  of  content,  by  the 
same  method  by  which  the  earlier  dualisms  tvere  transcended. 

Thusit  is  to  be  concluded  that  the  aestheticexperience  as  being 
an  experience  of  unity  of  subject  and  object,  as  the  two  aspects 
of  thought  and  will,  as  well  as  being  also  a  furthering  of  the  self 
toward  what  Professor  Tufts  has  called  the  'broadlv  significant' 
fullv  meets  the  demands  of  the  epistemological  postulate  in 
these  two  respects. 

(j)  The  Aesthetic  Experience  as  Meaning  the  Singular  and 
Immediate. 

But  while  the  Intellectuahsts  and  the  Voluntarists  differ  as 
to  what  constitutes  an  object  of  knowledge,  the  former  emphasiz- 
ing the  subjective  aspect,  the  latter  the  objective,  both  agree 
that  the  object  of  knowledge  as  that  in  which  the  subject  finds 
itself  fullv  reflected  must  necessarily  be  one  of  single,  immediate 
experience.  The  absolute,  according  to  Bradley,  must  hold  all 
content  in  an  individual  experience  where  no  contradiction  can 
exist — a  unity  which  transcends  and  vet  contains  a  manifold 
appearance.''  Me  also  describes  such  an  immediacy  of  thought 
and  existence  as  being  nothing  but  'sentient  experience.'*     Pro- 

'  and  '  Hrailliv,  A  ppcarancf  on  J  Rf  nitty,  ch.  xv. 


THE  AESTHETIC  JS  UIPER-LOGICAL.  59 

fessor  Royce  makes  objectivity  a  matter  of  purpose.      Ideas  are 
selective.     Thev  seek  their  own.     They  attend  onlv  to  what 
thev  themselvts  have  chosen.      Moreover  they  desire   in   their 
own  way.       The  object  thus  comes  to  be  preciseh'  what   it   is 
because  the  ideas  as  internal  meanings  mean  it  to  be  rlu-  object 
of  the  ideas  themselves.     Ideas  are  also  to  be  judiieil   in  the 
light  of  what  thev  intend  and  the  world  of  the  ideas  is  simply 
will  itself  determinately  embodied.      The  only  possible    object 
that  an  idea  can  ever  take  note  of  is  precisely  the  complete  con- 
tent of  its  own  conscious  purpose,  and  the  limit  of  the  process 
would  be  an  individual   (singular)   judgment  wherein  the  will 
expressed    its   own    final    determination.      "What    is    real,"    he 
says,  "is,  as  such,  the  complete  embodiment,  in  individual  form 
and  in  final  fulfilment,  of  the  internal  meaning  of  finite  ideas." 
This  common  demand  upon  the  part  of  the  Intellectualists 
and  the  \'oluntarists  alike,  that  the    object  of  knowledge    must 
needs   be   individual    and    immediate — while    representing   the 
'other'  of  knowledge  as  that  which  while  not  yet   real   is  to   be 
treated  as  if  it  were,  what  Bosanquet  calls  'an  act  of  pure  faith' — 
is  to  be  regarded  as  an  attempt  to  express  two  types  of  meaning 
which  we  found  were  not  embodied  in  the  logical  character  of 
thought,  namelv,  the  attitude  of  belief  and  the  'singular'  tvpe 
of  judgment.      But  once  more  we  find  that  these  two  types  of 
meaning    are    rendered    in    rhe    aesthetic    consciousness.     1  he 
immediacy  of  the  aesthetic  experience  has  been  long  recognized. 
Plato  speaks  of  it  as  'pure  pleasure  free  from  desire. '     Schopen- 
hauer calls  it  a  'stilling  of  the  w  ill,'  w  hile  Kant  refers  to  the  same 
experience  under  the  aspect    of  'disinterestedness    or   contem- 
plation.'     In   more  recent  literature  it  is   known  as  'conscious 
self-illusion,'  imitation  and  'make-believe.'     Cohn,  in  his  Allgf- 
meitie  Aesthetiky  assigns  to  the  semblant  constructit)n  an  inten- 
sive or  immanental  value  as  opposed  to  the  consecutive  or  trans- 
gredicnt  value  of  the  true  and  good  as  pointing  always  beyond 
themselves.     Psychically  play  is  wholly  non-utilitarian  in  value. 
The  child  does  not  play  for    the    sake    of   some    further  end. 
The  plav-object   while   recognized   as   not   real   is   nevertheless 
indulged  in  as  if  it  were    real    and    is   so    for   the   time   being. 
It  is  unreal  onlv  with  reference  to  the  interest  which  erected  it. 


6o  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

As  Professor  Baldwin  has  expressed  ir  in  his  as  yet  unpubHshed 
lectures,  the  senihlant  object  is  a  construction  that  claims  one 
control  and  has  any  form  of  control  except  the  one  claimed. 
But  only  because  of  this  is  it  fitri-d  to  supersede  and  transcend 
the  control  of  any  particular  kind.  The  disinterestedness  is 
due  to  the  union  of  motives  which  point  toward  and  terminate 
in  some  form  of  indirect  or  mediate  control.  In  fact,  it  is  to  be 
said,  that  the  resulting  immediacy  is  due  to  the  absence,  through 
suspension  for  the  time  being,  of  the  motives  that  would  make 
the  situation  a  real  one.  It  is  accepted  and  treated  as  being 
what  it  is  not.  It  might  be  true  or  good  or  real  but  immediately 
rather  than  through  some  external  form  of  control.  The  situa- 
tion  is  one  wholly  determined  from  within  as  satisfying  the  inner 
demand  for  unity.  The  content  thus  treated  is  detached  from 
its  original  moorings  and  erected  into  a  world  apart.  But  this 
world  is  a  closed  world.  Consciousness  and  its  object  are  one  and 
immediate,  in  the  sense  that  the  self  finds  itselt  fully  absorbed  in 
the  object  of  its  contemplation.  The  aesthetic  experience  thus 
represents  a  furthering  of  experience  by  widening  the  process  of 
comprehension  and  at  the  same  time  reveals  and  enlarges  the 
self  that  has  been  hidden,  as  it  were,  behind  the  mediate  and 
discursive  operations  of  thought.  The  process  of  world-con- 
struction and  world-interpretation  is  essentially  a  process  of 
embodying  the  self  in  what  hitherto  seemed  wholly  foreign  to 
us. 

Hence  it  is  that  all  art  is  animistic  and  religion  anthropo- 
morphic, thought  and  conduct  can  be  generalized  and  the 
true  and  the  good  become  so  in  their  own  right  onlv  in  so  far  as 
the  individual  can  identify  himself  with  his  world.  But  since 
such  identity  can  be  attained  neither  in  th(Hight  nor  will,  as  is 
to  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  both  the  Intellectualists  and  the 
Voluntarists  seek  such  identity  of  the  self  and  its  object  in  an 
immediacy  of  experience  which  is  neither  thought  nor  will, 
it  must  be  sought  in  some  ideal  construction.  There  is,  there- 
fore, a  further  agreement  among  writers  upon  epistemological 
theory  that  the  transcendent  notion  which  serves  to  unify  the 
dualistic  character  of  thought  and  will  bears  the  impress  of  art 
rather  tiian  of  science.      Ihe  type-phenomenon  which  appears  as 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HYPER-LOGICAL.  6 1 

the  solution  of  the  cpistemologicnl  prohlcm  at  the  several  stages 
of  its  development  are  characterized  always  by  an  appreciative 
or  selective  element.  Kverv  philosopliical  system  appears  as  a 
work  of  art.  Lange  has  called  philosophical  construction  an 
art  because  of  the  idealizing  tendency  exhibited  in  it,  tlu-  tend- 
ency to  look  for  the  highest  expression  of  the  real  in  the  ideal. 
But  knowledge  has  been  found  to  be  essentialK'  an  idealizins: 
process.  The  various  stages  of  this  process  are  reflected  in  the 
several  stages  of  the  development  of  the  aesthetic  experience. 
Hegel  shows  remarkable  insight  in  insisting  that  knowledge  as  a 
process  reflects  the  coming  to  full  consciousness  of  the  self.  But 
the  self  also  passes  through  a  series  of  stages  in  the  course  of  its 
development,  so  that  each  object  determined  by  the  self  is  also 
a  further  determination  of  the  self.  The  aesthetic  experience 
represents  always  a  construction  of  the  self  out  of  its  own  mate- 
rials for  the  sake  of  its  own  embodiment,  a  construction  in  winch 
consciousness  has  to  do  onlv  with  its  own.  Ihe  semblant  object 
thus  becomes  an  object  for  sensuous  apprehension  and  con- 
sciousness accepts  it,  not  because  of  its  truth  or  goodness  but 
rather  because  it  finds  itself  expressed  in  it  in  individual 
form. 

Such  an  experience  meets  the  demands  alike  ot  the  Inrd- 
lectualist  and  the  Voiuntarist.  In  it  the  three  types  of  mean- 
ings left  unexpressed  by  thought  are  given  complete  embodi- 
ment. In  the  object  thus  erected  the  mind  rests  satisfied  as  with 
something  complete,  self-sustaining  and  unique  and  which 
leaves  no  purpose  unfulfilled,  no  estrangement  ot  self  and  not 
self  unreconciled.  In  the  work  of  art  the  form  and  matter,  the 
content  and  the  control  are  inseparable.  As  an  ideal,  it  is  not 
to  be  contrasted  with  the  real  world  wiiich  stands  hard-and- 
fast,  but  is  the  embodiment  of  an  exclusive  interest.  The  ideal 
does  not  necessitate  a  break  with  the  real,  but  is  only  the  real 
raised  to  a  higher  plane.  Ihe  'other'  of  Bradley  and  the 
'external  meaning'  of  Rovce,  reach  after  ideal  constructions  in 
which  the  self  realizes  itself.  The  individuality  which  each 
attaches  to  the  object  as  the  other  of  thought  and  volition  is  an 
'intent'  meaning  and  is  what  it  is  only  because  the  self  sets  it  up 
and  accepts  it  for  what  it  reads  into  it.      It  is  an  'other'  only 


62  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

because  it  is  ideal  and  ir  is  ideal  onK'  hctause  the  self  erects  it 
under  its  own  presupposition  ot  control.  It  is  immediate  and 
singular  because  the  self  finds  itself  fuUv  reflected  in  the  object 
thus  constructed.  As  freed  from  all  sorts  of  foreign  and  mediate 
control,  such  as  characterize  thought  and  volition,  the  self  can 
now  move  about  m  a  world  under  its  own  form  of  control.  The 
embarrassment  and  limitations  of  the  dualistic  character  of 
thought  and  will  are  removed  by  the  setting  up  of  a  new  and 
higher  immediacy,  so  that  the  work  of  thought  can  proceed  to 
new  and  higher  determinations.  The  aesthetic  experience,  it 
is  thus  concluded,  functions  as  the  epistemological  postulate  of 
world    unification   and   world   interpretation. 

Miss  Adams  is  quite  right  in  seeking  to  place  the  aesthetic 
e.xperience  within  the  general  process  of  thinking,  meaning  by 
thinking  the  attempt  upon  the  part  of  thought  to  escape  from  a 
dualistic  experience.  But  in  placing  the  aesthetic  experience 
at  the  close  of  the  thought-process,  as  a  sign  that  thought  as 
unimpeded  action  may  go  on,  she  appears  to  reduce  the  aesthetic 
experience  to  a  mere  accompaniment  of  thought,  rather  than  as 
serving  some  function  within  the  thought-process.  Thought, 
for  Miss  Adams,  and  the  Pragmatists  generally,  means  the 
breaking  down  of  an  immediacy  of  stimulus  and  response,  and 
finds  its  function  in  restoring  the  immediacy  thus  lost.  From 
immediacy  to  immediacy  thus  represents  the  whole  of  thought. 
Upon  the  analysis  of  the  aesthetic  experience,  she  finds  that  it 
exhibits  precisely  those  characteristics  attaching  to  an  immediate 
experience,  whence  the  conclusion  that  the  aesthetic  rises  at  the 
end  of  and  indicates  the  success  of  the  thouglu-])rocess.  1  he 
aesthetic  experience  thus  becomes  a  sort  of  by-product — a  feel- 
ing accompanying  a  smooth  working  experience. 

In  the  present  discussion  it  has  been  shown  that  the  aesthetic 
experience  arises  with  the  epistemological  consciousness.  Ihe 
latter  is  a  dualistic  experience  occasioned  In  tin  presence  in 
consciousness  of  contrasted  meanings.  The  reconciliation  and 
completing  of  these  contrasted  meanings  becomes  the  epistem- 
ological problem  at  the  several  stages  of  mental  iltvelopment. 
The  devflopmenr  of  thought  has  |")roccded  oiil\  In  .in  increasing 
determinateness    of   its    two    aspects.     Unless    the    content    of 


THE  AESTHETIC  AS  HYPER-LOGICAL.  63 

thought  at  anv  stage  of  its  developinent  can  be  treated  with 
reference  to  a  further  meaning,  the  content  becomes  at  once 
fixed  and  static.  On  the  other  liand,  unless  the  control  aspect 
is  informed  and  hinited  in  its  operations  it  becomes,  as  in  the 
case  of  fancy,  a  meanmgless  and  valueless  dynamic.  1  he 
epistemological  problem  thus  becomes  always  the  search  after 
a  mode  of  conscious  determination  in  which  these  contrasted 
meanings  are  brought  into  a  whole  of  meaning  without  the  loss 
of  either.  As  Professor  Baldwin  has  put  it,'  "a  discrete  unin- 
tellifrible  dynamic  is  no  better  than  a  contentless  formal  static." 

It  has  also  been  our  purpose  to  show  that  thought  is  reduced 
to  the  postulate  of  an  empty  and  mystical  experience  when  a 
solution  of  the  problem  presented  by  the  presence  in  conscious- 
ness of  contrasted  meanings  has  been  attempted  by  exclusively 
emphasizing  the  one  of  these  two  aspects  of  thought  to  the  com- 
plete exclusion  of  the  other.  From  our  present  point  of  view 
the  epistemological  problem  becomes  the  setting  up  of  a  mode 
of  experience  in  which  to  use  the  same  author's  words,  thought 
has  a  way  of  finding  its  dynamics  intelligible  as  a  truthful  and 
so  far  static  meaning,  and  also  of  acting  upon  its  established 
truths  as  immediate  and  so  far  dynamic  satisfactions. 

The  point  of  view  contended  for  in  the  present  investigation 
is  that  the  aesthetic  experience  represents  a  mode  of  mental 
determination  in  which  these  two  types  of  meaning  are  recon- 
ciled and  thus  unified  and  completed.  In  tracing  out  the 
several  stages  of  the  development  of  the  aesthetic  it  is  shown 
that  each  such  stage  reflects  the  character  of  the  epistemological 
problem  at  the  corresponding  stage  of  its  development.  When 
the  reflective  mode  of  consciousness  has  been  reached,  with  the 
presence  of  meanings  which  thought  as  mediate  and  discursive 
is  unable  to  reduce,  it  is  shown  that  the  aesthetic  experience,  as 
a  hyper-logical  mode  of  consciousness,  has  those  characteristics 
which  enable  it  to  set  uji  an  experience  in  which  the  dualistic 
character  of  thoutrht  is  transcended.  Our  conclusion  then  is 
that  the  aesthetic  experience  has  arisen  with  the  epistemological, 

'  PsvcholoRti-al  Bullettri,  .April  15,  1907,  p.  124;  see  also  Thought  and  Things, 
Vol.  II,  Appendix,  II. 


64  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

has  passed  thn)u<ih  a  corresponding  series  ot  stages  of  develop- 
ment, and  lias  throughout  functioned  as  theepistemological  postu- 
hite  of  unification  and  completion.  It  is  not  therefore  to  be 
placed  at  the  completion  of  thought  but  must  rather  be  regarded 
as  marking  the  pausing  place  in  reflective  thought  brought  about 
bv  a  process  of  mediating  and  thus  reconciling  the  otherwise 
dualistic  character  of  experience. 

Reaching  thus  the  conclusion  that  the  aesthetic  has  arisen 
with  the  epistemological  and,  as  representing  the  expression  of  a 
type  of  interest  sui  generis,  functions  as  the  epistemological 
postulate  of  the  unification  and  completion  of  experience,  it  is 
to  be  shown  in  the  following  chapters,  that  in  the  development 
of  thought  in  the  race,  the  two  types  of  experience  have  arisen 
and  developed  pari  passu,  and  that  here  also  the  aesthetic  has 
functioned  as  the  postulate  of  a  unified  and  completed  thought. 


I'AR'l    II.     HISTORICAL. 

Chapter  V. 

Greek  'Thought  from  the  Earliest  Beginnings  to  Thnles:  A-Junl- 
istic  in  Character,  hence  Pre-Eptstemological  and  Pre-A es- 
thetic,   and   Illustrative   of  the   First   Immediacy. 

In  the  following  chapters  an  attempt  is  made  to  trace  the 
development  of  thought  with  reference  to  the  rise  and  develop- 
ment alike  of  the  Kpistemologicnl  and  the  Aesthetic,  together 
with  the  use  made  of  the  aesthetic  Consciousness  as  the.organ 
of  world  unification  and  interpretation.  It  will  he  shown  that 
the  aesthetic  and  the  epistemological  have  arisen  together, 
and  that  each,  in  the  course  of  its  development,  has  passed 
through  a  series  of  well-defined  modes,  all  of  which  may  he 
reconstructed  with  a  tolerahle  degree  of  completeness.  It  will 
also  be  shown  that  the  several  modes  of  development  of  the 
one  are  in  essential  agreement  with  the  corresponding  modes  in 
the  development  of  the  other.'  In  other  words,  each  mode  of 
thought  will  be  found  to  have  had  its  corresponding  mode  of 
aesthetic  expression.-  It  will  also  appear  that  the  conflicts  and 
embarrassment  of  the  epistemological  became  the  occasion  and 
opportunity  of  the  aesthetic.  The  character  of  the  aesthetic  at 
the  several  stages  of  its  development  will  he  found  to  have  been 
determined  bv  rlu-  character  of  rlu-  epistemological  problem 
demanding  solution.  Ihe  motive  of  the  aesthetic  is,  therefore, 
to  be  sought  in  the  epistemological.  Professor  I  utrs  has 
insisted  that  the  motives  are  to  be  souiiht  within  the  domain  of 
social  psychology.  Ihis  conclusion  is  reached  onlv  In  making 
the  social  prior  to  thought,  whereas  in  the  present  connection, 
thought  as  common,  is  made  the  material  of  the  social  process. 
The  conclusion   upon   which   the   jircscnt  attempt  is  based,   is 

'  F.  Hegel,  Phil,  of  Fine  Art,  trs.  by  Hosanquct,  p.  lOI. 
'  Cf.  Hirn,  The  Origins  of  Art,  p.  2. 

65 


66  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

that  the  motives  of  the  aesthetic  consciousness  arc  to  be  sought 
in  eptstcmology  ratlier  than  sociology. 

It  has  already  been  pointed  out  that  the  epistemological  con- 
sciousness must  be  treated  genetically  and  that  the  several 
dualisms,  through  which  thought  passes  in  the  course  of  its 
development,  are  to  be  regarded  as  the  successive  modes  of  its 
development.  At  each  of  these  dualistic  experiences  the  epis- 
temological problem  arises  anew.  These  successive  dualisms  are, 
furthermore,  to  be  regarded  as  situations  into  which  conscious- 
ness grows,  rather  than  states  imposed  ab-extra.'  If  we  are  to 
regard  the  several  dualistic  experiences  into  which  consciousness 
develops  as  'wounds,'  they  must  be  regarded  as  wounds  of 
consciousness'  own  making,  the  leaves  for  whose  healing  are 
found  arising  with  the  wounds,  since  as  Hegel  says  "the  hand 
which  inflicts  the  wound  is  the  hand  that  must  heal  it." 

The  subject-object  dualism  of  reflective  thought  within 
which  the  epistemological  problem  par  excellence  arises,  is  not, 
therefore,  a  datum  of  immediate  experience,  but  represents  that 
mode  of  conscious  determination  and  control  of  experience  made 
possible  and  intelligible  by  a  series  of  earlier  dualistic  experiences. 
Within  each  of  these  earlier  stages  an  epistemological  problem 
arose  whose  solution  made  possible  the  next  higher  mode  of 
determination  and  control  of  presented  content.  But  in  each 
instance,  the  problem  became  the  problem  of  the  unification  of 
experience.  From  the  analytic  point  of  view  the  epistemolog- 
ical consciousness  is  dualistic,  the  unitv  ot  which  can  onlv  be 
secured  by  the  healing  of  the  breach.  Hut  since  the  dualism  is  of 
consciousness'  own  making,  there  is  the  presumption  that  it 
will  also  bring  about  its  own  healing.  In  the  present  attempt, 
the  purpose  is  to  show  that  the  aesthetic  consciousness  arises 
with  the  epistemological  and  jiresents  always  an  ideal  unity  in 
which  the  unity  and  completion  of  experience  are  obtained. 

Maintaining  the  dualistic  character  of  the  epistemological 
consciousness  there  is  no  need  of  carrying  our  investigations 
beyond  the  thought  of  the  Greek  world.-     "The  birth-day  of 

'  Ct.  W.iici,  N  (ititraltsm  and  A  gnosticism,  \o\.  II. 

'  Windclbaml,    H istory  of  Philosophy,   p.   23;    V.rdmau,  History  of  Philos- 
ophy, p.  13;  Gompcrz,  Thf  Greek  Thinkers,  Introduction. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  TO  THALES.  67 

our  modern  world"  says  Hegel,  "is  the  moment  when  the  Greek 
sages  began  to  construe  the  tacts  of  the  universe.  Before  their 
time  the  world  lav  as  it  were  in  a  dream-life.  Unconsciously  in 
the  womb  of  time  the  spirit  of  the  world  was  growing  -the 
faculties  forminc  in  secrecv  and  silence — unrd  the  dav  of  birth 
when  the  preparations  were  completed  and  the  young  spirit 
drew  its  hrst  breath  in  the  air  ot  thought.  Among  the  Greeks 
the  Reason  Hrst  became  conscious,  since  they  were  the  first  to 
make  the  distinction  between  sense  and  thought."' 

But  the  distinction  thus  referred  to  was  only  gradually 
reached.  The  earliest  conceptions  of  the  Greeks  are  found  to 
be  those  possible  at  a  period  when  consciousness  is  relatively 
a-dualistic.  Ihe  earliest  Greeks  possessed  no  clear  distinction 
between  mind  and  matter,  the  material  and  the  spiritual.'  One 
must,  therefore,  be  naive,  as  Professor  Dewey  says,  in  dealing 
with  Greek  philosophy  and  not  introduced  distinctions  which 
only  arose  later.  Throughout  the  period  indicated  at  the  head 
of  the  present  chapter  Greek  consciousness  was  the  rather  vague 
and  undifferentiated.  Here  as  in  the  Orient  custom  forbade 
any  separation  of  fact  and  meaning.  The  'fatal  boon  ot  knowl- 
edge' had  not  yet  been  born  and  the  immediate  unity  ot  con- 
sciousness was  as  yet  undisturbed.  Sensuous  presence  was  the 
only  reality  and  the  world  was  one  of  pure  appearance. 

As  the  world  on  the  banks, 

So  is  the  mind  of  man. 
******* 

Only  the  tract  where  he  sails 

III'  wots  of;  only  the  thoughts 

Raised  by  the  objects  he  passes  are  his.' 

The  researches  of  the  archaeologist  and  thi  comparative 
anthropologist  have  succeeded  in  pushing  farther  back  the 
boundary  line  of  the  historic  past,  and  the  period  of  (jteek 
philosophy  before  Thales  has  been  reconstructed  with  great 
fulness  and  accuracy.     Regarding  consciousness  as  active  and 

'  Wallace,  The  Lope  oj  Iligel,  p.  261. 
'  Janet  and  Scaillcs,  ProbUtns  of  Philosophy,  p.  214. 
'  Matthew  Arnold,  The  Future. 


68  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

reconstructive,  rather  tlian  passive  and  receptive,  its  active  and 
reconstructive  processes  are  here  seen  in  their  entire  spontaneity. 
I'ritnitive  man  uneniharrassed  by  a  duahstic  experience  and 
wliollv  freed  from  the  compeUing  character  of  external  control 
and  the  demands  of  rational  conceptions  gave  the  freest  embodi- 
ment to  his  active,  dispositional  tendencies.  This  stage  in  the 
development  of  the  thought  of  the  race,  not  unlike  the  corre- 
sponding period  in  the  development  of  the  individual,  is  char- 
acterized by  the  creation  of  myths.  As  the  product  of  an 
a-dualistic  consciousness  the  myth  is  to  be  defined  with  Vignoli  as 
"The  psychological  objectification  of  man  in  all  the  phenomena 
he  can  perceive."*  From  the  analvtical  point  of  view  it  may  be 
said  that  the  world  presented  is  determined  largely  in  terins  of 
the  affective-volitional  disposition  without  any  distinction  what- 
ever appearing  to  consciousness  between  the  two  factors  thus 
involved. - 

This  first  stage  of  thought  must,  therefore,  be  regarded  as 
one  of  relative  immediacy — a  stage  in  which  thought  is  free 
from  internal  complexity  and  in  which  stimulations  call  forth 
immediate  responses.  The  unreflective  myth,  as  the  character- 
istic product  of  this  first  immediacy,  is  to  be  regarded,  neither  as 
a  thing  of  pure  presentation,  nor  of  existential  judgment,  but 
rather  one  of  pure  'presumption.'^  1  he  deliverances  of  this 
a-dualistic  consciousness  are  accepted  as  real,  since  no  disturb- 
ing experiences  have  as  yet  arisen  within  the  sphere  of  reality- 
feeling.^  These  unreflective  myths  have  been  regarded,  and 
rightly,  as  the  first  attempt  at  a  metaphysics  of  nature.  In  tact, 
from  the  beginning  until  now,  whenever  pure  reason  has  been 
found  inadequate,  thought  has  sought  refuge  in  some  form  of 
mythological  construction.  Whatever  theory  ot  the  universe 
primitive  man  possessed,  is  to  be  souglu  in  the  myth.  It  at 
once  includes  both  science  and  religion  and  regulates  both 
social  and  private  life.^ 

'  Quotiii  liv  Kibot,  The  Crtuitive  Imagmalton,  p.  121. 

'Cf.  Wuncit.  Outlines  of  Philosophy,  trs.    by  judd,   p.  303   ff.;   and    Terr)', 
The  Approach  to  Philosophy,  p.  225. 

'Urban.  Psxrhotogical    Rcvinv.      Two    Aniclcs,  Vol.    XIV,    Nos.   I   .iml   2. 
*  Baldwin,  Handbook  of  Psychology,  Feeling  and  ff  ill,  pp.  148  ff. 
'  Cf.  Butcher,  Aristotle's  Theory  of  Poetry  and  Fine  Arts,  p.  375. 


UNIv 


J 


GREEK  THOUGHT  TO  T HALES.  69 

A.  Lang  and  others  have  shown  that  the  social  life  of  the 
Greeks  before  the  dawn  of  reflective  thoLin;ht,  was  a  matter  of 
group  maintenance,  controlled  by  specific  and  traditional  cus- 
toms. The  individual  was  in  unconscious  unit\'  with  the  com- 
munity of  which  he  chanced  to  be  a  member,  and  both  regulated 
and  justified  his  life  through  reference  to  the  ideals  incarnate  in 
the  habits  and  customs  of  the  community.'  Then  it  was  true 
that  the  individual  did  not  think  but  knew,  since  there  was 
neither  occasion  nor  opportunity  of  thought.  The  individual 
was  one  with  the  situation  in  which  he  lived.  In  tact,  he  carried 
the  entire  situation  within  himself.  Primitive  man  was  thus 
social  from  the  outset  and  there  is  no  justification  for  the  later 
contention  that  the  individual  when  first  found  stood  alone  and 
had  in  some  way  to  be  made  social.  The  materials  and  motives 
of  whatever  determinations  of  presented  content  the  individual 
might  make  were  common  to  the  group,  but  since  they  were  not 
psychically  common,  they  are  rather  to  be  regarded  as  'aggre- 
gate' in  character.-  We  should  expect  to  find,  what  in  fact  we 
do  actually  find,  tiiat  the  unreHective  myths  are  wholly  anony- 
mous as  to  their  origin  and  collective  as  to  their  reference.  It  is 
not  without  significance  that  no  names  are  found  attaching  to 
the  myths.  There  was,  as  yet,  no  distinction  between  the  pro- 
ducers' and  the  spectators'  point  of  view  and  the  myth  became 
the  sole  means  of  e.xpression  of  the  social  and  mental  life,  and 
like  the  fancies  of  the  individual,  at  the  corresponding  period, 
became  the  sole  reality  of  primitive  man. 

Regarding  the  unreflective  myth  as  the  product  of  a  primitive 
and  uncritical  consciousness  and  characterizing  primitive 
thought  as  the  representation  of  concrete  objects  in  terms  of 
the  subject  himself,  without  the  distinction  between  subject  and 
object  coming  into  consciousness,  the  materials  and  motives  of  the 
polarization  of  the  a-dualistic  consciousness  are  already  present. 
There  follows  close  upon  this  early  period  of  spontaneous  myth 
creation  a  period  of  transformation  and  decline.  Accepting 
the  classification  of  the  mvths  proposed  by  Ribot  into  explica- 

'  Cf.  A.  Lang,  \fyth.  Ritual  and  Religion,  Vol.  I,  ch.  9,  Vol.  II,  ch.  17. 
'  Vide  Baldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  Yo].  I.  p.  I4S  ff;  cf.  A.  Lang,  Cuj/om  and 
Myth,  p.  5;  Paulsen,  Introd.  to  Philos.,  p.  6. 


7° 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 


tive  and  non-explicative/  it  becomes  extremely  easy  to  indi- 
cate the  influences  that  tended  to  make  a  reconstruction  of  the 
former  necessary.  Primitive  thoue:ht,  as  anthropologists  and 
ethnologists  have  shown,  is  anthropomorphic  in  character. 
The  earliest  conceptions  of  the  world  were  purely  mythical, 
because  none  other  were  possible.  The  myth  thus  becomes 
the  response  to  a  series  of  needs  both  theoretical  and  practical, 
but  which  have  not  as  yet  become  distinct  from  each  other. 
The  resulting  interpretation  is  not  however  subjective,  as  Ribot 
insists,  but  rather  'projective'  thus  corresponding  to  what 
Urban  has  called  pure  'presumption. '- 

The  subsequent  stages  in  the  development  of  thought  repre- 
sent stages  within  this  first  immediacy,  so  that  using  the  term 
objective  in  a  somewhat  loose  sense,  it  can  be  said,  that  the 
development  of  thought  is  not  from  the  subjective  to  the  objec- 
tive but  a  development  within  the  objective.'  The  embarrass- 
ments that  supply  the  materials  and  motives  of  a  new  determina- 
tion of  thought,  are  to  be  sought  in  rhe  increase  of  inner  possi- 
bilities and  differences  of  attitude  toward  presented  content, 
rather  than  in  the  compelling  character  of  the  outer.  The  sev- 
eral movements  both  in  the  land  of  Greece  and  the  outlying  col- 
onies referred  to  in  the  present  connection  are  selected  for  the 
purpose  of  showing  how  they  contributed  to  the  isolation  and 
deepening  of  the  inner,  in  contrast  with  the  outer,  thus  making 
a  reconstruction  of  experience  both  possible  and  necessary. 

Then  as  now,  'tempora  et  res  mutantur,'  and  the  fact  of 
change,  as  Windelband  says,  became  the  stimulus  to  reflection; 
and  the  rise  of  reflection  means  that  the  old-time  equilibrium  of 
stimulus  and  response,  motive  and  sanction,  is  breaking  down. 
It  is  precisely  within  these  changed  and  changing  conditions 
that  we  are  to  seek  the  rise  of  the  inner-outer  dualism.  Sense- 
perception  and  memory  alike  arc  questioned  in  a  world  whose 
scenes  are  constantly  shifting.  Vhe  unreflective  myth-making 
consciousness  loses  its  position  and  supremacy  as  the  organ  of 
world  interpretation  and  unification.     The  multiplicity  of  myths 

'  Ribot,  Essay  on  the  Creativr  Imagination,  p.  131. 

'  Cf.  Urban  in  Psychological  Rrvinv,  Vol.  XIV,  1907,  Nos.  I  and  2. 

'  Cf.  Bosanquct,  Essentials  of  Logic,  p.  22. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  TO  T HALES.  7 1 

and  the  host  of  deities  become  a  stumbling  block  to  some  and 
foolishness  to  others,  while  the  legends  clustered  like  'weeds  in 
the  pathless  and  primeval  forest.'  The  thinning  ax  was  every- 
where in  demand  and  as  well  the  hand  that  could  wield  it  with 
cunning.  Ihe  familiar  attitudes  no  longer  bring  the  old-time 
satisfactions,  and  new  experiences  are  constantly  arising  tiiat 
throw  the  individual  into  confusion.  Custom  forbade  tlie 
separation  of  fact  and  meaning,  but  the  familiar  supports  are 
failing  precisely  when  and  where  most  needed.  The  world  long 
held  together  is  fast  falling  asunder.  1  hings  are  no  longer  what 
they  seem,  and  fact  and  meaning  are  no  longer  identical. 

As  has  been  indicated  the  unreflective  myth  served  to  satisfy 
both  theoretical  and  practical  needs  which  are  n(^t  as  yet  dis- 
tinguished from  one  another.  The  explicative  and  the  non- 
explicative  myths  are  significant  as  indicating  the  presence  and 
operation  of  the  materials  and  motives  of  the  differentiation  of 
the  primitive  constructions  within  the  first  immediacy.  What 
is  especially  significant  is,  that  when  the  demand  for  a  trans- 
formation of  the  myths  came,  it  was  with  reference  to  the  former 
rather  than  the  latter.  It  is  important  also  to  observe,  that 
within  the  sphere  of  the  explicative  myths,  the  process  of  trans- 
formation did  not  issue  in  philosophic  speculation  wholly  free 
from  mythical  elements.  Hence  from  the  beginning  until  now, 
despite  the  increasing  skill  and  strength  of  science  as  the  rival 
of  the  imagination,  the  latter  has  not  lost  its  position  as  an  inter- 
pretative and  reconstructive  principle  of  thought.'' 

The  increasing  failure  of  the  explicative  myths  in  the 
presence  of  increased  knowledge,  tended  to  throw  the  non- 
explicative  in  greater  relief  and  thus  sharpen  the  contrast 
between  the  inner  and  the  outer.  In  the  race,  as  also  in  the 
individual,  the  embarrassment  occasioned  by  the  failure  of  the 
'representing'  and  'conversion'  value  of  images^  became  the 
need  and  opportunity  of  fancy,  which  by  a  relatively  spontaneous 
flow  of  images  detached  from  the  process  in  wliich  they  occur, 
seeks  to  regain  the  original  immediacy  and  thus  end  tiie  con- 

'  Cf.   Urban, 'Appreciation  and   Description   and  the  Psychology' of  Values,' 

Philosophical  Revirw,  Nov.,  1905. 

'  Baldwin,  Thought  an  J  Things,  \'ol.  I,  ch.  v. 


71  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

flict  arising  between  expectation  and  icalitv.  "Nothing"  says 
Sullv,  "seems  more  to  characterize  the  childhood  of  the  race 
than  the  myth-making  impulse  which  by  an  overflow  of  fancies 
seeks  to  hide  the  meagerness  of  knowledge."  1  bus  the  world 
of  fancy,  nor  unlike  the  primitive  myth-world,  becomes  a  'pro- 
jective' world  in  which  thought  can  once  more  wander  with 
absolute  spontaneity.  The  naive  consciousness  accepts  it  with- 
out question  and,  while  neither  science  nor  history,  serves  for 
both  in  the  primitive  mind.  Both  the  myths  and  fancies  of  the 
unreflective  consciousness  are  frankly  naive,  claiming  neither 
meaning  nor  moral,  but  loved  for  their  own  sake,  as  children 
delight  in  Fairy  Tales  and  as  even  the  wise  of  the  'grown-ups, 
have  not  outgrown  genuine  delight  in  pure  romance. 

The  value  of  the  myth  is  to  be  sought  in  the  process  rather 
than  the  product.  The  failure  to  estimate  the  myth  from  this 
point  of  view  has  led  both  anthropologists  and  ethnologists  to 
attribute  to  it  only  a  negative  value  in  the  development  of  thought. 
Max  Miillcr  thus  defines  the  myth  as  a  'disease  of  language,' 
while  Herbert  Spencer  finds  its  origin  in  the  worship  of  the  dead. 
In  the  present  attempt,  the  myth-making  consciousness,  while 
looked  upon  as  pre-aesthetic,  is  nevertheless  regarded  as  the  rise  of 
a  process  of  world  objectification  and  unification  continuous  with 
the  mental  life.  Thought  is  at  the  first  'projective,'  in  the  sense 
that  it  reduces  the  presented  world  into  terms  of  what  it  itself 
has,  and  fancy  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  beginning  of  the  process 
of  unification  of  experience  which  will  be  shown  to  develop 
along  with  the  increasing  demands  and  possibilities  of  thought. 

Hut  the  spontaneity  of  fancy  does  not  sweep  away  the  per- 
sisting character  of  the  outer  as  held  wirhm  the  net  of  memorv. 
Both  the  demand  of  the  inner  as  embodied  in  fancy  and  the 
control  of  memory  are  now  present  and  operative  in  conscious- 
ness and  the  first  real  sundering  of  consciousness  is  upon  us. 
Bur  the  dualism  is  not  complete,  in  rhar  rhe  inner  as  yet  pos- 
sesses only  a  contrast  value.  The  jiresence  of  alternative 
responses  and  the  compelling  character  of  the  new  objects  of 
presentation  contribute  to  the  separation  of  fact  and  meaning, 
datum  and  dispositional  tendencies,  stimulus  .iiul  response. 
Neither  m}thological  cosmology  nor  aphoristic  ethics  is   ade- 


GREEK  THOUGHT  TO   THJLES.  73 

quate  to  the  demands  which  the  individual  now  makes  of  them. 
As  Professor  Caird  says:  "The  dehcate  moon-ht  web  of  poetic 
fiction  which  the  Greek  inKii;ination  (fancv)  had  woven  around 
the  crude  naturahsm  of  pre-historic  rehgion,  insensibly  coloring 
and  ideali/ing  it,  could  not  maintain  itself  in  the  light  of  a  critical 
age."'  Ihe  nuths  of  the  earlv  cosmogonists  and  theogonists 
yield  to  a  poetrv  in  which  a  subjective  element  appears.  The 
naive  culture  of  Mycenae  so  beautifully  pictured  in  the  Homeric 
poems  began  to  yield  to  individual  thought  and  treatment.  1  he 
primitive  myths  were  recast  by  the  masters  of  choral  song  and 
"The  neutral  tints  of  the  back-ground  were  ever  more  and  more 
relieved  by  strong  self-conscious  figures  standing  out  from  the 
uniform  mass."- 

Until  now  no  question  is  asked  touching  the  meaning  and 
origin  of  things  and  the  emancipation  of  thought  from  habit  and 
custom  means  that  the  power  of  grasping  the  meaning  of  things 
apart  from  rhcir  actual  existence  has  really  come.  "The 
Greeks"  says  Zeller,  "were  the  first  who  gained  sufficient  free- 
dom of  thought  to  seek  for  the  truth  respecting  the  nature  of 
things,  not  in  religious  tradition  but  in  the  things  themselves; 
among  them  a  strictly  scientific  method  first  appears,  a  knowledge 
that  follows  no  laws  except  its  own,  became  possible.^  Reality  is 
no  longer  a  matter  of  undisturbed  feeling,  and  presence  and  mean- 
ing are  no  longer  identical.  The  images  detached  from  their 
original  sense  moorings  and  used  as  ideas,  meanings,  the  prob- 
lem at  once  arises  of  adapting  these  meanings  to  new  situations 
and  the  satisfaction  of  varied  interests.  The  problem  of  the 
inner  and  the  outer  has  come,  whose  reconciliation  became 
the  burden  of  thought  and  the  epistemological  problem  of  all 
Greek  thought.  The  rise  of  a  dualized  experience  is  significant 
as  indicating  that  the  epistemological  consciousness  with  its 
characteristic  problem  of  unification  has  come  and  it  remains  to 
show  in  the  next  chapter  that  the  aesthetic  consciousness  has 
also  arisen  and,  as  'semblant'  consciousness,  becomes  the 
appropriate  organ  of  the  interpretation  and  unification  of  the 
inner-outer  dualism. 


'  Caird,  Evolution  of  Theology  in  the  Greek  Philosophers,  Vol.  II,  p.  41. 
'  Gompcrz,  The  Greek  Thinkers,  Vol.  I,  p.  II. 
'Zeller,  Pre-Socratic  Philosophy,  Vol.  I,  p.  133. 


Chapti:r  Y\. 

Greek   Thought  froju   T hales  to  Nco-Platonism  as  Illustrating 
the  Epistemological  Use  of  the  Aesthetic  Consciousness  as 
the  Organ  of  fVorU  Unification  and  Interpretation. 

That  outward  circumstances  and  thought  act  and  re-act  on 
each  other  is  a  truth  that  has  passed  into  a  truism  in  our  day, 
but  in  Greece  it  was  a  fact  preeminently  true  and  important. 
From  Thales  to  the  death  of  Aristotle  must  be  regarded  as  the 
great  epoch  of  Greek  speculation  within  which  is  comprised  all 
that  is  most  perfect  and  brilliant  in  ancient  philosophy.  When 
the  period  began,  Greek  thought  was  just  beginning  to  emanci- 
pate itself  from  the  mythological  cosmogonies  and  theogonies,^ 
while  at  the  close  of  the  period,  thought  had  mapped  out,  and  to 
some  extent  formed,  the  paths  along  which  subsequent  thought 
has  been  forced  to  travel.  But,  as  Gomperz  remarks,  before 
reflection  could  flourish,  a  considerable  mass  of  detailed  knowl- 
edge had  to  be  accumulated.  Both  geographical  and  tempera- 
mental conditions  were  highly  favorable  in  Greece  for  such 
enlargement  of  knowledge  during  the  period  from  Thales  to 
Plotinus.  The  growing  power  of  reflection  and  acquaintance 
with  the  knowledge  of  the  P2ast  awakened  the  notion  of  stability 
and  law,  which  brought  the  problem  of  matter  into  the  fore- 
ground of  human  thought. 

Other  tendencies  were  at  work  which  tended  to  throw  the 
individual  back  upon  himself  and  thus  sharpen  and  deepen  the 
inner  life.  The  development  of  industry  and  commerce,  of 
war  and  politics,  brought  the  individual  face  to  face  with  other 
occupations  and  aims.  Frequent  changes  in  the  polity  of  the 
state  led  men  to  regard  it  as  a  creation  more  or  less  human.  The 
presence  of  cases,  which  could  not  be  dralt  with  by  any  law 
already  in  existence,  necessitated  a  modiHcation  of  tin-  ideas 
themselves.     The    friction    of   circumstances    tends   always  to 

'  Ferrier,  Institutes  of  Metaphysics,  p.  165,  ct  seq. 

74 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  75 

dissolve  the  rigidirv  of  custom  nntl  tliscussion  is  horn,  whiili,  as 
Professor  Devvev  savs,  led  anionu;  the  Greeks  to  the  generation 
of  logical  theory.'  As  the  result  of  these  repeated  failures  of  the 
moral  law,  morals,  like  politics,  was  regarded  as  the  product  of 
individual  creation  and  hence  as  personal. 

The  beginnings  of  Greek  thought  are  to  be  sought  in  the 
colonies  rather  than  the  mainland,  which  as  Gomper/savs  'be- 
came the  play-ground  of  the  Greek  intellect.'  Reflection  takes 
its  rise  in  the  presence  of  change,  and  science  working  outward 
and  backward,  has,  from  the  time  of  Thales,  until  now,  been 
seeking  the  «,"/'*,  the  'what'  as  the  fundamental  stuff  out  of 
which  all  things  have  come,  and  in  which  their  explanation 
is  to  be  sought.-  Beneath  all  change  there  must  be  that  which 
does  not  change  and  which  gives  unity  to  the  othenvise  chaotic 
manifold.  The  so-called  'Physiologers'  from  Thales  to  Democ- 
ritus  were  seeking  a  postulate  which  would  make  all  change 
intelligible.  By  one  fell  stroke  Democritus  reduced  all  phe- 
nomena to  the  mechanics  of  atoms.  The  things  perceived  by 
the  several  senses  are  to  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of  mazy  dance  of 
physical  points,  since  the  atom  was  characterized  by  an  abstract 
corporeality.  The  atoms  are  as  manifold,  and  are  assigned  what- 
ever attributes,  the  problem  of  knowledge  may  demand.  They 
were  mechanically  and  mathematically  arranged  and  deter- 
mined. The  outer  world  is  no  longer  to  be  looked  upon  as  a 
"play-ground  of  innumerable  capricious  and  counteracting  mani- 
festations of  Will,"'  the  expression  of  unknown  and  unseen 
powers  shifting  the  scenes  from  behind,  but  rather  as  com- 
posed of  an  infinite  number  of  atoms  determined  in  all  their 
movements  and  combinations  by  unchangeable  law.  1  bus, 
as  Professor  Baldwin  says,  "The  outer  was  stripped  of  those 
relative  and  ambiguous  predicates  which  embarrassed  earlier 
speculation."* 


'  'Stages  in  the  Development  of  Logical  Theor)','  Philosophical Revtev,',  Vol.  IX, 
No.  V. 

'  Cf.  Aristotle,  Metaphysics,  I,  3,  983.  b6. 

'  Gomperz,  The  Greek  Thinkers,  Vol.  I. 

*  Proc.  St.  Louis  Congress  Arts  and  Science;  reprinted  in  Psychological  Review, 
Vol.  XII,  1905. 


76  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIES'CE. 

But  the  treatment  of  the  inner  did  not  keep  pace  with  the 
treatment  of  the  outer.  ByDeinocritusandthcAtomiststhemind 
was  looked  upon  as  a  series  of  ima<:;es  produced  by  the  move- 
ments of  the  atoms  constituting  the  outer.  The  images  were 
reduced  copies  of  external  objects.  The  contrast  between 
sense-perception  and  thought,  which  was  raised  by  Socrates 
was  explained  bv  the  Atomists  b\'  establishing  a  quan- 
titative relation  between  them.'  Ihe  psychology  of  Democ- 
ritus,  established  upon  a  materialistic  basis,  recognized  no 
independent  mechanism  of  ideas  as  conscious  states.^  The 
Atomists  emphasized  the  physical  side  of  the  dualism  of  inner 
and  outer  and  while  the  objective,  as  the  external,  was  carried 
very  far  toward  our  more  modern  conclusions,  the  subjective, 
as  the  inner,  was  given  only  negative  consideration  and  treat- 
ment.' The  general  recognition  of  the  relativity  of  the  data  of 
sense-perception  bv  Democritus  and  others,  contributed,  how- 
ever in  an  indirect  way  to  the  isolation  and  deepening  of  the 
inner.  Democritus  was  convinced  that  knowledge  was  not  pos- 
sible upon  a  basis  of  relativity.  Atomism  represents  a  search 
after  an  epistemological  principle  in  terms  of  which  the  world 
of  experience  can  be  explained  and  unified.  The  atoms  of 
Democritus  serve  as  'schemata'  the  twofold  purpose  of  scientific 
description,  namely,  communication  and  control  of  experience. 
They  are  however  'symbols'  not  'concepts,  and  thus  illustrate  the 
fact  that  all  description  involves  an  appreciative  or  selective 
element.  The  character  and  extent  of  the  appreciative  element 
thus  employed  depend  upon  the  purpose  in  view.  While  there- 
fore, the  primitive  explanations  of  the  world  have  yielded  to  a 
more  scientific,  the  selective  element  has  not  wholly  disappeared, 
and  whatever  unity  and  stability  were  found  in  the  world  of 
Democritus  and  his  contemporaries  must  be  sought  for  in  the 
aesthetic  consciousness,  as  a  mode  of  mental  determination  of 
presented  content. 

With  the  change  of  the  seat  of  philosophy  from  the  outlving 
colonies  to  the  home-land,  there  took  place  also  a  characteristic 

'  Aristotli-,  De  Anima,  I,  2,  4^06  b  30  (W-ilLnct). 

'  Vide  riuophr.istus,  Ph\s.  Opin.,  3  (l)itlil). 

'  Vide  Ferritr,  Institutes  of  Metaphysus,  pp.  161,  ct.  ff. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  -J-J 

change  in  the  character  of  phil()S()ph\'  itself.  Hitherto  philoso- 
phv  was  concerned  primarily  with  the  physical  universe.  But 
with  the  Sophists,  the  practical  aspect  came  forward.  The 
Protagorean  'homo  mensura  omnium'  is  significant  as  the  first 
explicit  recognition  of  the  inner  as  a  center  of  organization  and 
control.  The  Sophists,  as  pure  subjectivists,  retluced  knowl- 
edge to  mere  opinion.^  But  making  the  individual  the  measure 
of  all  things,  thev  were  unable  to  justify  knowledge  as  a  com- 
mon possession  and  in  the  end  gave  up  its  pursuit.  The  urgent 
problem  of  the  age,  how  to  secure  knowledge  which  would 
preserve  the  social  and  moral  life  of  the  nation  in  the  presence  of 
the  continued  failure  of  the  old-time  supports,  while  formulated, 
was  not  solved  by  the  Sophists.  To  the  solution  of  this  problem 
a  greater  Sophist  gave  both  his  thought  and  life,  whose  ^ryihOi 
aeauTKv'  is  significant  as  indicating  the  change  of  emphasis  in 
philosophic  thought. 

Socrates  raised  the  question  and  called  upon  every  individual 
to  raise  it  for  himself;  but  of  its  solution,  he  confesses  himself 
as  ignorant  as  any  other  individual.  The  outcome  of  the 
Sophistic  movement  was  the  discrediting  of  all  thought — "the 
futile  attempt  to  spin  truth  out  of  one's  own  inner  conscious- 
ness."- The  epistemological  problem  was  the  finding  ot  the 
common  element  of  all  thought — a  problem  which  Socrates  set 
himself  to  solve.  To  know,  is  in  order  to  do,  so  that  with 
Socrates  the  moral  consciousness  functions  for  the  first  time  as 
an  epistemological  postulate. 

To  think,  according  to  Socrates,  necessitates  common  prem- 
ises, as  well  as  a  common  end.  That  the  outer  is  the  deter- 
mining pole  in  the  inner-outer  dualism  of  the  age,  is  to  be  inferred 
from  the  fact,  tiiat  the  general  conceptions  which  Socrates  estab- 
lished bv  means  of  his  characteristic  method,  represent  the 
things  of  abiding  worth  in  the  existing  social  situation.  Mean- 
ing is  no  longer  identical  with  sense-perception,  but  is  rather 
what  one  intends.  Social  life  demands  community  of  conduct 
and  therefore  common  meanings,  but  since  consciousness  is  still 

'  Dcwev,  'Stapes  of  Lopical   Thcorv.'   Philos.  Rn.iifu-,  Vol.  I.\,  1 905. 
'  On  the  Sophists,  see  Aristotle,  .\fft.  III.,  2,  1004;  Plato,  Protogoras,  Jowct's 
Trs.,  beginning  at  p.  310  A;  TheaetetuSy  Ibid.,  p.  I5lh. 


78  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

regarded  as  passive  and  receptive  the   aspect    of  coniinonncss 
must  be  sought  witliout.' 

The  latter  part  ot  the  hfe  of  Socrates  covered  the  period  of 
tile  loss  of  Athenian  prestige  and  supremacy,  and  his  philosophy 
has  been  defined  as  an  attempt  to  hold  up  consistently  the  better 
ideals  of  Athenian  life.-  With  Plato,  Athens  having  yielded  to 
Macedonian  rule,  jihilosophv  came  to  be  an  attempt  to  recon- 
struct the  original  Greek  City-State.  His  philosoplu',  like  that 
of  his  master,  is  primarily  ethical,  hut  the  complete  failure  of 
the  outer  makes  reconstruction  possible  only  to  the  philosopher. 
Once  more  the  epistemological  problem  becomes  the  obtaining 
of  knowledge  which  will  justify  and  guarantee  conduct  m  the 
midst  of  constant  change.  Plato  also  recognized  that  neither 
thought  nor  conduct  is  possible  upon  a  relativistic  basis.  The 
senses  are  deceptive  and  perception  can  yield  opinion  only. 
Only  the  ideas  are  real.  Sense  experiences  become  real  only  in 
so  far  as  the^'  participate  in  the  ideas  or  imitate  them.  1  he 
ideas,  however,  are  'schemata,'  and  while  they  can  not  be  verified 
in  terms  of  sense-experience  they  are  the  necessary  presup- 
positions of  thought.  They  are  also  practical  as  were  the  notions 
of  Socrates,  as  representing  the  things  of  most  value  in  the  social 
situation. 

But  Plato  was  poet  as  well  as  philosopher,  seer  as  well  as 
scientist,  and  his  solution  of  the  epistemological  problem  is  poet- 
ical rather  than  logical.^  The  nnths  which  bulk  so  largely  in  the 
Dialogues  are  not  to  be  regarded  as  instances  of  defeat  or  grace- 
ful embellishments  merely,  but  rather  as  Westcott  says  "\'en- 
turous  essays  after  truth—  embodiments  of  definite  instincts — 
material  representations  of  speculative  doctrines  which  while 
affirmed  by  instinct  can  not  be  verified  by  scientific  process." 
As  the  unreflective  myth  represented  an  attempt  to  hold  together 
the  two  worlds  of  sense-presentation  ami  dispositional  tendencies 
so  in  the  hands  of  Plato,  the  nnth,  now  Income  conscious, 
bursts  in  upon  the  Dialogue  with  the  revelation  of  a  world  trans- 

'  Dewey,  Studies  in  Logical  Theory,  p  1 33. 

'Dewey,  Lectures  on  Greek  I'liilosophv  in  Johns  Hopkins  I'niversity,  1906- 
1907  (not  puhlisheil). 
'  Cf.  Phatdeus,  Jowctt's  translation,  p.  265  D;  Symposium,  Ibid.,  p.  201  D. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  yg 

cending  the  world  of  sense-experience  by  wliich  the  latter  is 
transfused  and  reduced  to  unity.  1  he  myths  of  Plato  are, 
therefore,  vital  and  integral  parts  of  the  Dialogues  and  repre- 
sent deliverenccs  of  that  larger  aspect  of  consciousness  which  as 
Stewart  says  "Is  not  articulate  and  logical  but  which  feels  and 
acts  and  wills — to  that  major  part  of  our  nature  which  while  not 
able  to  explain  what  a  thing  is  or  how  it  appears  but  feels  that  it 
is  good  or  bad  and  thus  expresses  itself  in  judgments  of  worth  or 
value  rather  than  in  existential  judgments  of  fact.' 

Whatever  unity  therefore,  the  Dialogues  of  Plato  contain,  is 
to  be  sought  in  his  artistic  rather  than  in  his  logical  treatment. 
Still  Plato  is  unable  to  distinguish  between  the  True  and  the 
Good;  and  this  limitation  is  significant  as  reflecting  both  the 
character  of  the  epistemological  problem  and  the  nature  of  the 
aesthetic  consciousness  which  is  used  as  the  appropriate  means 
of  reconciling  the  inner-outer  dualism.  The  two  spheres  of 
reference  into  which  consciousness  is  now  polarized  are  the 
world  of  sensible  phenomena  and  the  world  of  ideas.  lo  rhe 
former  Plato  ascribes  no  specific  value  whatever.  The  world  of 
ideas  is  the  only  true  and  essential  world.  Fhe  plienomena  ot 
sense  may  lead  us  to  the  realm  of  the  eternal  ideas,  but  to  enter 
the  latter,  we  must  break  with  the  former.  The  original  beauty 
is  both  bodiless  and  colorless  and  bears  no  likeness  whatso- 
ever to  the  things  of  sense-perception.  Like  philosophy,  the 
organ  of  artistic  creation  is  a  sort  of  higher  inspiration.  The 
artist  is  no  longer  guided  by  scientific  methods  but  by  a  'sort  of 
uncertain  and  tentative  empiricism.'  Art  products  are  there- 
fore for  Plato,  a  species  of  phantasy  and  while  he  nowhere 
defines  precisely  what  the  term  phantasy  means  as  used  by  him, 
it  nevertheless  appears  to  be  a  creation  lying  mid-way  between 
the  phenomena  of  sense-perception  and  the  immutable  ideas, 
corresponding  to  what  in  the  case  of  the  development  of  thought 
in  the  individual  we  found  to  be  a  process  of  'sembling'  as  the 
form  bv  which  contents  of  thought  are  advanced  and  accepted  as 
'assumption'  as  compared  with  'pure  presumption'  of  the  first 
immediacy.     In  one  connection  Plato  hints  that  there  might  be 

»  Stewart,  The  Myths  of  Plato,  p.  21. 


8o  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

a  more  pt-rfect  art  because  of  a  complete  knowledge,  but  then 
art  and  philosophy  would  become  identical.  If  we  define  the 
epistemological  problem  as  it  presented  itself  to  Plato,  as  the 
unification  of  experience  now  sundered  by  the  inner-outer 
dualism  and  known  as  the  problem  of  the  one  and  the  manv,  we 
are  justified  in  concluding  that  bv  the  use  of  the  aesthetic  con- 
sciousness Plato  sought  to  solve  the  problem  thus  presented  by 
reducing  his  world  to  an  artistic  whole.  Thus  the  expression  of 
the  'one  in  the  many,'  of  'unity  in  variety'  which  represents  the 
truly  aesthetic  principle  of  Greek  thought  touching  the  beauti- 
ful, represents  also  the  urgent  problem  of  Greek  speculation 
and  its  characteristic  solution.  Plato  clearlv  recognized  the 
epistemological  problem  set  by  his  two-fold  world  of  ideas  and 
sense-phenomena,  and  sought  its  solution  in  terms  of  beauty, 
which  placed  between  the  two  worlds  became  the  abiding  sign 
and  evidence  of  the  presence  of  the  Absolute  and  the  stimulus 
to  the  development  of  higher  possibilities. 

The  continuity  of  Greek  thought  must  be  sought  in  Aris- 
totle, rather  than  in  the  several  Platonic  Schools  that  arose  after 
the  death  of  the  Master.  Both  Plato  and  Aristotle  agree  in 
defining  philosophy  as  the  science  of  the  concept,  as  the  uni- 
versal element  of  thought  and  conduct.  But  while  Plato  makes 
the  universal  the  starting  point  of  his  philosophy  and  attempts 
to  deduce  the  particular  from  it,  Aristotle  begins  with  the  par- 
ticular datum  of  experience  and  seeks  to  ascend  to  the  universal. 
For  Aristotle  experience  is  the  true  cause  of  knowledge  rather 
than, a  mere  occasion,  as  Plato  taught.  The  former  universal- 
ized the  concept  by  placing  it  in  a  world  apart  and  above  the 
particular,  while  the  latter  makes  the  universal  an  attrduite  of 
the  mind  itself.'  Form  and  matter,  the  universal  and  the  par- 
ticular, actuality  and  potentiality,  are  related,  and  the  determin- 
ation of  the  relations  exiscinc  between  them  becomes  tiie  ciiief 
task  of  the  philosopher. 

I  he  jihilosopiu'  before  Aristotle  represented  a  series  of 
attempts  to  regulate  and  reorganize  the  social  situation  fast 
disintegrating,  hence  its  practical  character.      B\-  the  time  of 

'  Mel.,  Ill,  4.  999;  De  .lltiui,  II,  5,  417. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  8l 

Aristotle,  social  lite  has  disintegrated  beyond  all  hope  ot  success- 
ful reorganization,  so  that  thinkuig  can  be  followed  because  of 
its  own  interest.  Since  the  State,  as  the  sphere  of  abiding  truth 
and  values,  has  wholly  failed,  such  sphere  can  be  sought  only  in 
and  through  thought.  In  fact,  as  Professor  Dewey  has  shown, 
two  short  generations  sufficed  to  effect  a  complete  divorce 
between  philosophy  and  lite,  and  the  isolation  ot  rcHective 
thought  from  practical  conduct.'  IMiilosopiu'  now  became  an 
organ  of  vision,  an  instrument  of  interpretation,  rather  than  a 
series  of  attempts  to  reclaim  and  reorganize  a  social  situation 
that  had  wholly  failed. 

The  limitation  of  the  Aristotelian  procedure  is  to  be  seen  in 
the  fact,  that  Aristotle  w-as  obliged  to  assume,  as  self-evident, 
certain  fundamental  truths  which  were  neither  established  nor 
modified  by  thought,  but  which  stood  in  their  own  right. - 
Apart  from  such  truths  the  mind  is  still  in  the  grasp  of  fancy  and 
opinion.^  It  became  necessary  to  assume  these  fundamental 
truths  as  posts  to  which  to  fasten,  organize  and  control  the 
otherwise  particular  and  contingent  experiences.  No  question 
was  asked,  at  the  first,  touching  the  universality  and  credibility 
of  the  truths  thus  assumed.  Later  however  the  problem  of  the 
*quod  semper,  ubique,  ab  omnibus,'  became  one  of  special  impor- 
tance. But  with  Aristotle  "commonness"  was  assumed  and  as 
in  the  case  of  Plato  it  may  be  concluded  that  the  material  thus 
assumed  by  the  philosopher  was  of  a  'syndoxic'  character.  The 
sphere  of  presuppositions  was  therefore  'common-as-common, 
so  that  the  use  of  it  was  more  like  to  obtain  general  approval 
and  acceptance. 

Aristotle's  philosophy  represents  an  attempt  to  solve  the 
dualism  inherent  in  the  Platonic  conception  ot  lileas.  But 
while  he  diil  not  solve  the  problem  presented  In  the  dualistic 
consciousness,  he  cleared  the  wa\  tor  a  solution  not  hitherto 
possible.  For  Plato  the  world,  as  objective,  is  just  the  uni- 
versal of  thought,  which  in  his  abstract  fashion,  he  separates 


'  Johns  Hopkins  University  Lectures  on  (jreek  Pliilosophv  (not  puMislied). 

'  Aristotle,  Ana.  Post,  II,  IQ,  99A,  20. 

'  Aristotle,  Metaphysics,  XII,  9,  1086,  b  8. 


82  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

coniplerelv  from  the  particulars  of  sense  bv  setting  them  apart 
as  self-subsisting  realities. 

To  bring  these  two  worlds  together  represented  the  epis- 
temological  problem  which  Plato  bequeathed  to  his  successors- 
The  positive  contribution  of  Aristotle  is  his  contention  that  the 
universal  and  the  particular  do  not  dwell  apart  in  complete 
isolation,  but  that  the  universal  existed  only  in  and  through  the 
particular,  while  the  latter  existed  onlv  in  and  for  the  former.' 
Reality,  therefore,  must  be  found  in  the  indissoluble  union  of 
these  two  aspects  of  thought.  Thought  and  sense  can  not  be 
taken  apart  from  each  other,  except  by  a  process  of  abstraction. 
The  individual  is  not,  therefore,  the  given  of  sense,  as  Plato 
held,  but  the  joint  product  of  sense  and  the  universals  of 
thought,  of  matter  and  form.  In  fine,  the  aspects  of  the  prob- 
lem presented  bv  the  epistemological  consciousness  are  rather 
two  aspects  within  the  same  process.  Matter  as  the  unformed 
tends  toward  form  with  something  akin  to  desire,  so  that  matter 
is  not  negation  as  Plato  would  say  but  privation.  Form  on  the 
contrary  as  the  final  and  efficient  cause  is  the  source  of  specific 
determination,  actuality  and  perfection,  while  matter  remains 
nevertheless  a  real  principle  of  being. 

The  process  of  world-construction  was  considered  by  Aris- 
totle after  the  analogy  of  the  plastic  arts  in  which  the  materials 
employed  serve  not  only  as  a  limit  to  the  realization  of  formative 
thought,  but  as  the  means  of  the  revelation  of  thought  itself. 
The  artist  is  not  confined  to  a  slavish  imitation  of  things  as  they 
are  but  it  is  possible  for  him  to  reproduce  things  as  they  might 
be.  Art  is  no  longer  the  imitative  reproduction  of  nature, 
which  is  itself  a  copy  only,  as  Plato  taught,  but  an  act  of  creation 
in  the  form  of  an  image  in  which  the  incomplete  purpose  of 
nature  and  her  defects  are  corrected. - 

Aristotle  thus  saw  in  arr,  as  Butcher  says,  a  rational  faculty 
which  divines  nature's  unfulfilled  intentions  and  reveals  her  ideal 
to  sense. ^  The  illusions  which  it  empU)ys  are  of  consciousness' 
own   making  and  acceptance  ami  instead  of  cheating  the  mind 

'  Arisfotlc.  .fn.i.  Post,  I,  II,  77  a  5;  Mtt.  \I,  ifi,  IO40,  IU7. 

'  Butcher,  Aristotle's  Theory  of  Poetry  and  the  Fine  Arts,  pp.    1 10,  14.4.  I  50. 

'  Ibid. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  83 

as  Plato  thought,  image  forth  the  immanent  idea  which  can  not 
find  expression  under  the  forms  of  material  existence.  Poetry 
is,  therefore,  more  philosophical  tiian  history  according  to 
Aristotle,'  and  when  we  recall  the  long  and  bitter  feud  between 
poetry  and  philosophy  the  conclusion  becomes  extremely  signifi- 
cant. Between  poetry  and  history,  however,  there  was  no  such 
feud  and  in  primitive  times  the  two  are  identical.  Poetry, 
according  to  Plato,  is  only  fiction  and  all  fiction  is  necessarily 
immoral,  hence  poets  must  be  denied  citizenship  in  the  ideal 
republic.  In  the  Poetics  of  Aristotle  there  is  a  manifest  attempt 
to  heal  this  strife  and  Aristotle  finds  in  art  the  meeting  point  of 
the  universal  and  the  particular,  of  form  and  matter.-  Poetry  is 
thus  related  to  philosophy  in  that  it  seeks  also  to  express  the 
universal  as  pure  form.  It  finds  its  differentia  from  philosophy 
in  the  fact  that  while  their  content  is  identical,  the  method  ot 
expressing  the  content  is  wholly  different.  Given  reality  is 
still  the  sphere  of  reference  and  control,  but  to  Aristotle  it  must 
be  ideal. 

But  if  realitv  is  thus  preserved,  in  what  direction  does 
the  process  of  idealization  proceed  and  what  is  the  standard  by 
which  such  procedure  is  to  be  judged  .''  Thus  far,  we  have 
seen,  that  moralistic  considerations  embarrassed  aesthetic  specu- 
lation and  artistic  creation.  This  was  due  to  the  fact  that  the 
theoretical  and  the  practical  activities  of  consciousness  were  not 
clearly  differentiated.  With  Aristotle  the  two  forms  of  activity 
are  clearly  recognized  as  distinct  and  the  attempt  is  actually 
made  to  give  each  independent  treatment.  With  Aristotle  the 
practical  is  made  subordinate  to  the  theoretical.  Art,  however, 
is  for  Aristotle  a  practical  science,  since  distinction  between  the 
fine  and  useful  arts  was  not  reached  by  the  Greeks  at  all.' 
Nevertheless  the  recognition  of  the  beautiful  as  subordinate  to 
the  practical  is  significant  as  indicating  the  rise  of  the  sense  of 
value  and  the  interpretation  of  the  world  from  the  standpoint  of 
meaning.     Bur    these    meanings,    values,    ideals,    can    not    be 

'  Ibid.,  p.  153  ff. 
'  Butcher,  op.  cit.  p.  360  ff. 

*  Bosanquet,  Histrtry  of  Aesthetics,  p.  22;   cf.  also.  Butcher  o/>.  fi/.,  144,  and 
ch.  iv. 


84  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

expressed  in  terms  of  the  theoretical  reason  which  must  take 
things  as  they  are.  In  the  instance  ahke  of  the  theoretical  and 
the  practical  rlu-  control  is  mediate  in  character  which  indicates 
that  consciousness  has  lost  its  old-time  immediacy.  Theoret- 
ical philosophy  sought  some  unifying  principle  hut  could  only 
arrive  at  the  conception  of  unity  in  terms  of  content  and  control 
outside  the  process  of  determination  and  construction.  Art, 
on  the  contrary,  as  the  expression  of  unity  in  direct  and  sensuous 
form,  supplied  the  postulate  demanded  alike  by  the  theoretical 
and  the  practical  reason.  Thus  both  Plato's  'reminiscence,' 
and  Aristotle's  'blessed  contemplation,'  represent  aesthetic 
attempts  as  a  solution  of  the  epistemological  problem  of  the  age. 

In  the  presence  of  the  dualism  of  inner  and  outer,  form  and 
matter,  the  actual  and  the  ideal,  consciousness  at  once  bounds 
beyond  'flamantia  moenia'  and  finds  refuge  and  victory  by 
identifying  itself  with  the  object  of  aspiration  and  contempla- 
tion, in  a  state  of  immediacy — a  state  in  which  reminiscences 
passes  into  intuition,  faith  into  sight  and  in  whicii  the  individual 
enters  into  the  contemplative  blessedness  of  the  Deity  in  a  life 
of  Svishless  absorption.' 

The  significance  of  the  several  schools  of  thought  that  arose 
after  Aristotle,  is  to  be  found  in  the  several  attempts  to  find  the 
criterion  of  rhouiihr  and  conduct  within  the  individual.  The 
thought  of  the  whole  period  is  ethical,  but  of  a  negative  charac- 
ter. Both  the  Stoics  and  the  Epicureans  were  materialists  in 
their  conception  of  nature  and  sensuous  in  their  theory  of  knowl- 
edge. The  former  were  fatalists  and  taking  life  more  seriously, 
their  philosophy  became  the  more  popular.  Nature  was  their 
great  word  as  a  whole  in  which  every  thing  is  necessitated  and 
purposive.  The  world  of  nature,  as  comprehending  the  things 
of  supreme  worth,  is  given  the  place  of  respect  and  authority 
formerly  enjoyed  by  the  outer  social  order.  The  fatalistic 
character  of  the  Stoics  shows  both  the  strensrth  and  limitation  of 
the  will.  Thought  being  unable  as  yet  to  create  a  world  for  the 
will,  the  latter,  by  the  aid  of  the  imagination,  from  which  it  is 
never  separated,  attempts  to  carry  itself  through.  The  Stoics 
at  once  turned  Pantheists,  which  means  always  an  identifica- 
tion of  the  actual  and  the  ideal,  *of  what  is  and  what  ought-to- 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  85 

bc.'^  For  the  Stoics,  there  was  no  margin  between  the  actual 
and  the  ideal,  hence  the  static  character  of  the  system.  The 
eschatological  element,  wjiich  bidks  so  large  in  the  literature  of 
the  Stoics  as  well  as  m  other  literature  of  the  time,  represents  an 
imaginative  embodiment  of  human  belief  touchin<i  the  Hnal 
outcome  of  things  and  \n  the  case  of  the  Stoics  represents  the 
carr}ing  of  aesthetic  insight  to  a  cosmic  conclusion.  The  dual- 
ism which  runs  through  Stoicism  is  a  dualism  within  matter, 
the  terms  of  which  differ  onl}'  (juantitatively  (a  sort  of  material- 
ized idealism),  hence  the  control  is  as  yet  in  the  outer.  Thus 
as  Bosanquet  indicates,  ''The  mechanical  view  of  the  imagina- 
tion, the  negative  or  intellectualist  view  of  the  emotions,  the 
complete  subordination  of  the  theoretical  to  the  practical,  all 
these  influences  hindered  the  Stoic  from  completing  his  con- 
ception of  man's  place  in  nature  by  an  adequate  theory  of 
aesthetic  expression."-  By  universalizing  the  individual  they 
found  neither  need  nor  opportunity  of  individual  activity  and 
construction  and  the  doctrine  of  imperturbability  or  complete 
freedom  from  the  outer  represents  an  attempt  to  merge,  in  a 
mystical  consciousness,  the  social  and  individual  aspirations  in 
a  far  away  dream  of  a  common  fellowship  of  wise  men.' 

The  Epicureans  made  the  'reasonableness  of  feeling'  the 
criterion  of  conduct  and  made  the  world  the  work  ot  chance. 
In  matters  of  cosmology  they  revived  the  atomic  theory  of 
Dcmocritus,  while  they  drew  their  ethics  and  theory  of  knowl- 
edge from  Aristippus.  Being  casualists  x\\q\  refused  to 
acknowledge  the  objective  value  of  art  as  expressing  a  definite 
content  and  even  went  so  far  as  to  reduce  all  imitative  art  to 
the  level  of  cookery.  Nevertheless,  the  Epicureans,  with  their 
characteristic  emphasis  on  feeling,  contributed  in  an  indirect 
way  to  the  isolation  and  deepening  of  the  inner.  Their  general 
likeness  to  the  Stoics  is  to  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  with 
both  the  highest  ideal  conceived  was  negative,  both  abhorred 
the  conditions  in  which  they  were  placed,  and  agreed  in  seeking 
happiness  by  freeing  the  individual  from  all  disturbing  elements. 

'  Martineau,  The  Study  of  Religion,  Vol.  II. 

'  Bosanquet,  History  of  Aesthctus,  p.  1 00. 

'  Cf.  The  Republic  of  Plato,  for  an  Ideal  State  for  Philosophers  only. 


86  Tilt:  .{ESTHETIC  FXPFRIEXCE. 

Both  the  cosniopolitaiiisni  oi  the  Stoics  and  tlie  individualism 
of  the  ICpicureans  contributed  to  the  loosening  of  the  ties  that 
bound  the  inner  to  the  outer  and  the  search  of  both  after  a 
criterion  of  truth  is  significant  as  indicating  that  the  standard 
of  truth  and  conduct  is  regarded  as  a  matter  ot  inner  deter- 
mination. 

Kuno  Fischer  suggests  that  the  pliilosophic  problem  after 
Aristotle  was  the  problem  of  freedom,  that  is,  the  freeing  of  man 
from  the  world  whose  dissolution  became  daily  more  evident. 
The  Stoics  would  have  men  attain  freedom  by  becoming  dead 
to  the  world  about  them,  while  the  Epicureans  would  have  men 
enjoy  as  much  as  possible  and  suffer  as  little.  The  Skeptics 
went  still  farther  and  sought  to  convince  men  that  the  problems 
pressing  for  solution  were  after  all  insolubK  .  Ihcse  three 
movements,  while  differing  in  details,  nevertheless  spring  from 
one  motive  and  aim  at  one  end,  namely,  the  freeing  of  the 
individual  from  the  world  and  the  attaining  of  a  self-conscious- 
ness contained  within  itself  with  entire  self-sufficiency. 

To  ground  the  individual  thus  freed  from  the  outer  world, 
and  to  create  for  him  a  world  in  which  he  can  'live  and  move 
and  have  his  being,'  becomes  the  urgent  problem  of  the  age. 
While  freed  from  the  outer,  the  individual  has  come  to  perceive 
that  the  inner  is  also  a  part  of  the  outer.'  Whether  the  inner 
be  made  pure  will  as  with  the  Stoics,  or  feeling  as  with  the 
Epicureans,  or  thought  as  with  the  Skeptics,  it  comes  to  be 
regarded  as  outer  also,  so  that  the  outer  now  claims  to  be  both 
inner  and  outer. 

In  chapter  11  it  was  shown  that  the  individual  is  brought 
face  to  face  with  a  similar  experience,  owing  to  what  Professor 
Baldwin  has  called  the  'anomalous  position  of  the  body;'  the 
resolution  of  this  double  claim  of  the  body  issues  in  the  sub- 
stantive dualism  of  niiiul  and  body.' 

But  while  widening  to  the  utmost  the  chasm  between  the 
inner  and  the  outer,  the  individual  also  seeks  their  union.  The 
epistemological  problem  as  to  the  reconciliation  of  the  corporeal 
and  the  incorporeal,  the  jihvsical  ami  the  spiritual,  the  temporal 

'  Plotinus,  EnneaJs,  1\'.,  7,  sec.  2  (Criutzcr  text). 

'  Thought  and  Things,  Vol.  I,  p.  95ff.;  cf.  cli.iptcr  ii  of  this  p.iper. 


GREEK  THOUGHT  AFTER  THALES.  87 

and  the  eternal,  represents  the  philosopliical  problem  of  the  last 
years  of  anticjuitv.  The  historians  of  the  period  agree  in  hold- 
ing that  the  thought  of  the  period  is  characterized  bv  a  search 
after  aid  in  all  possible  sources,  but  more  especially  in  the 
Orient.  The  motive  for  such  procedure  is  close  at  hand. 
Since  the  outer  has  failed,  only  two  possible  modes  of  reconcil- 
ing the  dualistic  experience  are  open:  either  b\'  supernatural 
revelation  on  the  part  of  God  or  supernatural  illumination  on 
the  part  of  the  individual.  Accordingly  aid  was  sought  in  two 
principal  sources.  In  the  first  place  deliverance  was  sought  in 
the  Jewish  Scriptures,  which  had  been  made  known  to  the 
Greek  world  through  the  Septuagint  translation.  It  is  to  be 
noted  also  that  the  external  fortune  of  the  Jews  at  this  time  made 
them  kin  to  the  individuals  of  the  Graeco-Roman  world,  while 
the  ardent  hope  of  future  restoration,  the  spiritualized  concep- 
tion of  God  and  the  conception  of  angels  as  mediating  between 
God  and  man,  made  the  Jewish  Scriptures  extremely  attractive 
to  the  individuals  of  the  Graeco-Roman  world.  But  while 
Greek  thought  was  purely  intellectual  and  thus  made  thought 
and  reality  identical,  Jewish  thought  conceived  ot  Ciod  as  the 
highest  reality  in  terms  of  will.  The  world  is  regarded  as  the 
expression  and  embodiment  of  the  will  of  God  and  is  therefore 
purposive,  rather  than  mechanical,  while  the  Messianic  Hope, 
which  unifies  the  Jewish  Scriptures,  reaches  its  climax  in  the 
Incarnation,  which  has  been  called  the  'Poetry  of  Conscience.' 
The  reconciliation  of  the  two  worlds  is  thus  secured  by 
means  of  the  working  will,  whicii  has  now  become  conscious  of 
itself  as  apart  from  the  materials  with  which  it  operates.'  The 
resulting  construction  is  neither  a  transcript  of  the  outer,  nor  a 
creation  of  pure  fancy,  but  a  world  which  while  not  existent  is 
nevertheless  accepted  and  treated  as  if  it  were  in  actual  exist- 
ence. The  world  thus  erected  in  which  the  several  demands 
of  consciousness  are  recognized  and  reconciled  is  no  longer  a 
'presumption'  such  as  characterized  the  first  immediacy,  but 
rather  an  'assumption.'  In  the  construction  ot  this  world 
materials    are    borrowed    from    any   source    whatsoever.     The 

'  Plotinus,  op.  cit.,  IV.  7,  sec.  7;  \',  11,  12S,  i,  3  et  seq.;  IV,  7,  sec.  8. 


88  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

period  therefore  is  comparable  to  the  corresponding  period  in 
the  development  of  thought  in  the  individual,  which  we  know 
as  tile  'semblant'  or  play  consciousness.  The  result  is  that  we 
are  now  presented  with  an  aesthetic  of  the  will,  and  beauty  comes 
to  be  regarded  as  coordinate  with  morality  rather  than  stthordi- 
vate  to  it  as  in  the  earlier  aesthetic  theory. 

The  selective  aspect  of  the  thought  of  the  period  is  to  be  seen 
also  in  the  tendency  to  go  back,  to  the  older  conception  and  the 
selection  made  is  extremely  significant  as  showing  the  epis- 
temological  value  ot  the  earlier  mythical  constructions.  1  he 
individual,  in  turning  to  the  past  finds  two  movements  of  thought 
which  answer  his  need,  namely,  the  teachings  of  Pythagoras  and 
Plato,  and  both  are  at  once  surrounded  with  a  halo  of  divine 
authority.  But  since  the  Pythagorean  numbers  must  be  taken 
conceptualh'  only,  the  Neo-Platonic  philosophy  becomes  the 
more  valuable. 

Plato's  doctrine  of  the  Ideas,  as  descending  step  b\'  step 
from  the  highest  unity  to  the  lowest  limit,  where  form  enters 
into  matter,  is  at  once  seized  upon  as  supplying  the  reality  of 
the  two  poles  of  the  dualism,  as  well  as  supphing  the  series  of 
intermediate  beings  which  as  rungs  in  the  ladder  become  the 
means  of  communication  and  thus  of  reconciliation  of  the  two 
worlds,  otherwise  completely  irreconcilable.^     The  primordial 
Being,    as  the   Idea  of  the  Good,  is    placed  beyond  the  world 
of  men  and  things.-     The  intermediate  beings  are  not  the  result 
of  the  creative  act  ot  God,  but  rather  emanations  of  his  fullness.' 
The  significant  aspect  of  these  emanations  is  that,  as  emanations 
rather  than  determinations  of  either  thought  or  will,  they  become 
the  plastic  material  of  aesthetic  or  semblant  treatment.      It  is 
precisely  here  that  we  are  to  seek  for  the  general  advance  in 
aesthetic  theory  and  construction  in   Plotinus. 

According  to  Plotinus  and  also  Dio  Chrysostom  and  Philo- 
stratus,  art  is  not  a  more  or  less  exact  imitation  of  an  outer  copy- 
world,  wliich  IS  itself  only  a  copy,  but  the  expression  of  a  selective 
will  in  sensuous  form.      But  since  Plotinus  was  an  emanationist, 

'  riotimis,  op.  ctt.^  V,  sec.   I;  II,  i68. 

'  riotimis,  op.  rit.,  VI,  9,  sec.  6. 

'  Cf.    The  I'Icroma  doctrine  of  the  New  Testament. 


GRKEK  THOUGHT  .1FTF.R  THALES.  89 

rather  than  an  evolutionist,'  tliat  w  liich  is  realized  in  the  forni  of 
art  is  necessarily  less  than  the  idea — the  created  less  than  the 
creator — but  he  nevertheless  insists  tliat  "  If  any  one  condemns 
the  arts  because  they  create  by  way  of  imitation  of  nature,  first 
we  must  observe  that  natural  things  themselves  are  an  imitation 
of  something  further  and  next  we  must  bear  in  mind  that  the 
arts  do  not  simph-  imitate  the  visible  but  go  back  to  the  reason 
(Logous — Ideas)  from  which  nature  comes  and  that  they  create 
much  out  of  themselves  and  add  to  that  which  is  defective  as 
being  themselves  in  possession  of  beauty."  Art,  therefore,  is 
no  longer  slavishh'  imitative,  but  rather  symbolic. 

Nevertheless  by  making  matter  wholly  antipodal  to  mind,  a 
complete  reconciliation  of  the  dualism  is  impossible.  To  solve 
the  epistemological  problem  thus  presented  the  individual  must 
rise  above  the  material  and  temporal  world-  and  grasp  the 
eternal  idea  from  which  all  things  proceed  and  which  therefore 
gives  meaning  and  value  to  all  things. 

The  moralistic  considerations  which  embarrassed  the  aes- 
thetic theory  alike  of  Plato  and  Aristotle  are  removed  by  Ploti- 
nus  and  beauty  comes  to  be  regarded  as  the  direct  expression  of 
reason  by  means  of  aesthetic  semblance.  Still,  the  Absolute 
Reason,  while  within  the  universe  as  the  outer,  is  not  contained 
by  it,  hence  it  can  not  be  given  in  terms  of  external  nature.  Thus 
one  must  go  beyond  the  process  in  which  the  dualism  originated 
for  its  solution.  Lcstasy  rather  than  reason  becomes  the  organ 
of  the  apprehension  of  beauty.  Above  the  intellectual  intuition 
is  the  ecstatic  intuition  of  the  One  in  which  the  duality  of  the 
human  and  the  divine,  the  corporeal  and  the  spiritual,  the  tem- 
poral and  the  eternal,  ot  thought  and  being  is  reconciled  through 
an  immediacy  of  contact  with  the  Primordial  Being.  Ecstasy, 
therefore,  as  a  symbolic  experience,  becomes  the  means  of  tran- 
scending self-consciousness  by  erecting  an  object  which  tran- 
scends ail  particular  determinations.  The  beautiful  is  more 
than  a  matter  of  unit\'  in  variety;  it  is  the  whole  in  which  the 
parts  are  lost  to  view  and  which  bodies  forth  in  symbolic  fashion 


*  Plotinus,  loc.  cit.,  V,  sec.  2. 
'  Ibid.,  VI,  9,  10. 


90  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

the  eternal  beauty  and  significance  of  the  universe.*  Insisting 
upon  the  epistemological  problem  as  the  unification  of  experi- 
ence, it  is  to  be  concluded  that  in  transcending  the  inner-outer 
dualism  the  Neo-Platonists  made  use  of  the  aesthetic  conscious- 
ness as  the  organ  of  world  unification  and  interpretation. 

'  Vide,  Enneads,  IV,  I,  a  passage  in  which  Plotinus  bids  us  mount  by  means 
of  the  beauty  of  the  external  world,  to  the  contemplation  of  the  'ideal  form,' 
the  'universal  world.' 


Chapter  VII. 

The  Development  of  Thought  from  Neo-Platonism  to  the  German 
Mystics  of  the  Sixteenth  Century,  as  Illustrating  the  Pro- 
gression from  the  Inner-Outer  Dualism  to  that  of 
Mind-Body,  in  %uhich  the  Mind  Term  of  the 
Dualism  IS  Distinguished  from  the  Body 
Term  only  for  Theoretical  and  Theo- 
logical  Purposes. 

The  mystical  reconciliation  of  the  inner-outer  diKilisni  by 
the  Neo-Platonists  represented  the  merging  of  a  two-fold  con- 
trol. There  was,  in  the  first  place,  an  actual  turning  to  the  past 
for  materials  already  under  definite  and  guaranteed  coefficients 
of  control.  The  imperturbable  self-certainty  of  the  post-Aris- 
totelian philosophy  had  been  so  completely  shaken  with  the 
continued  failure  of  the  outer  order,  that  man  everywhere  as 
in  need  of  help  and  no  longer  finding  his  own  insight  sufficient 
turned  to  the  'records  of  the  past.'  These  writings  of  the 
earlier  periods  were  regarded  as  the  means  of  a  higher  revelation. 
As  Windelband  has  pointed  out,  the  striking  characteristic  of 
the  period  after  Aristotle  is  the  search  after  authority,  and 
not  capable  of  being  spun  out  of  one's  own  inner  imagination 
and  thus  gotten  immediately,  was  sought  in  historically  accredited 
revelations.  Divine  revelation  thus  became  the  highest  source 
of  all  knowledge.^  But  the  selection  and  manipulation  of  these 
materials  were  matters  of  individual  illunnnation  :iiui  thus 
immediate  in  character.  The  Neo-Platonic  Mysticism  repre- 
sents a  theory  of  knowledge,  which  as  Windleband  says,  con- 
tains a  heightened  value  of  the  individual  as  evinced  in  fcelinj! 
and  as  the  attempt  at  a  fulfilment  of  the  longing  of  the  age  that 
truth  might  be  arrived  at  by  experience  as  an  inner  communion 
of  the  individual  with  the  Supreme  Being.  But  since  the  dual- 
ism was    not    complcrt',  tlie    inner    possessing  'contrast  value' 

'  Windelband,  History  of  Phil.,  cli.  vii,  p.   I02. 

91 


92  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

only,  the  symbolic  constructions  of  the  Neo-Platonists,  as  the 
seniblant  or  imitative  treatment  of  the  material  borrowed  from 
the  past  under  the  urgency  of  practical  need,  must  be  refjarded 
as  the  rather  quasi-aesthetic;  while  the  epistemological  con- 
sciousness with  its  characteristic  problem  of  unification  of 
experience  must  be  regarded  as  quasi-epistemological.  It  is  to 
be  inferred,  therefore,  that  the  aesthetic  arose  with  the  epis- 
temological  as  the  appropriate  organ  of  world  reconciliation  and 
interpretation  and  that  the  character  of  the  aesthetic  con- 
struction reflects  more  or  less  faithfully  the  character  and 
demands  of  tlie  epistemological. 

In  the  case  of  the  development  of  the  thought  of  the  race,  as 
also  in  the  case  of  the  growth  of  thought  in  the  individual,  the 
erection  of  a  semblant  object  under  inner  control  and  assigned 
meaning  which  ir  does  not  as  yet  possess  brings  forward  the 
problem  of  a  further  determination  of  the  inner.  Until  the  rise 
of  the  semblant,  the  body  was  recognized  as  the  abode  of  both 
the  outer  and  the  inner,  while  the  latter  was  wholly  lacking  in 
positive  determination.  As  the  result  of  the  imitative  treatment 
of  the  body  it  is  at  once  assigned  to  the  outer  as  a  sphere  of 
material  available  for  inner  treatment  and  tlu-  tulhlment  of 
inner  purposes.  But  with  the  rise  of  the  semblant,  the  same 
method  of  manipulation  is  applied  to  contents  once  inner,  so 
that  what  was  once  inner,  is  now  made  outer,  while  the  inner, 
as  such  migrates  still  farther  within.  It  is  precisely  here  that 
we  are  to  seek,  for  the  materials  and  motives  of  the  dualism  of 
the  material  and  the  spiritual,  the  corporeal  and  the  incorporeal, 
that  ran  throughout  the  philosophy  of  the  Middle  .Ages  and 
which  finally  issued  in  the  mind-body   dualism   ot    Descartes. 

The  development  of  the  epistemological  consciousness  is 
thus  seen  to  be  the  separation  and  increasing  determinateness 
of  the  two  factors  that  enter  into  its  objective  constructions  as 
embodiments  of  meaninsi.  Ihese  two  factors  are  the  content 
and  the  control.  The  characteristic  of  consciousness  in  its 
first  immediacy  was  that  it  involved  no  separation  of  these  two 
factors.  Ill  classic  (jreek,  thought  was  largely  'projective' 
and  phdosoplu'  represented  a  series  of  attempts  to  secure  tran- 
(juillity  in  the  midst  of  certain  failure.      Both  the  epistemological 


NEO-PLATONISM  AND  EARLT  MYSTICISM.  93 

problem  and  its  aesthetic  solution  were  rather  objective — in  the 
sense  however  of 'projective'  that  does  not  imply  the  correspond- 
ing subjective.  The  continued  failure  of  the  outer  as  held  in 
memory  and  the  rapid  enrichment  of  experience  in  the  Htrh 
and  fourth  centuries  made  necessary  and  possible  the  dis- 
tinction of  theoretical  and  practical  interest.  With  Plotinus, 
however,  we  hnd  the  first  instance  of  the  determination  of 
an  object  as  possessing  a  meanmg  and  existence  determmed 
by  the  mind  itself.  But  it  remains  to  be  pointed  out,  that 
in  the  end,  the  thought  of  the  Neo-Platonists  terminates,  on 
the  objective  or  content  side,  in  a  sphere  which  lies  beyond 
existence  and,  on  the  subjective  side,  in  a  mystical  illumination, 
which  is  after  all  the  negation  of  thought.* 

But  the  erection  of  a  semblant  object  as  representing  the  coal- 
escence of  two  controls  raises  the  problems  connected  with  the 
terms  meaning,  existence,  reality,  together  v.  ith  the  larger  prob- 
lem of  individuation,  which  has  so  far  been  raised  only.  As  has 
been  indicated,  the  semblant  constructions  of  the  Neo-Platonists 
represented  an  imitative  treatment  of  materials  borrowed  from 
other  sources  and  accepted  as  being  under  a  definite  form  of 
control  but  which  was  lifted  from  its  original  moorings  and 
made  the  object  of  inner  manipulation  and  thus  assigned  to  a 
sphere  which  is  neither  outer  nor  inner,  but  in  which  the 
demands  of  both  are  recognized  and  realized.  The  resulting 
construction  was  due  very  largely  to  religious  interests  and  in 
the  disposition  of  the  object  thus  erected  the  two  attitudes 
merged  in  its  construction  at  once  issue  and  set  the  problem 
which  made  necessary  a  similar  construction  toward  the  close 
of  the  period  under  discussion.  The  theory  of  Inspiration  or 
Illumination,  which  as  the  merging  of  two  controls  and  thus 
the  symbolic  means  of  an  immediate  unity  ot  the  individual 
with  the  Supreme  Being  at  once  diverged  into  two  wholly 
different  forms.  In  the  case  of  the  Church,  borrowing  the 
material  and  model  of  its  organization  from  the  Graeco-Roman 
world,  revelation  as  Windclband  says,  became  fixed  as    histor- 

'  \"i(jf,  Enru-tiJsy  VI,  7,  ^4,  wluTf  Plotimis  s.ivs  that  'he  who  would  rise  above 
reason,  falls  outside  it.'  Cf.  also  Bigg,  Xco-Platonism,  p.  199.  Cf.  also  Sie- 
beck,  Religions phil.  StuJign,  I19. 


94 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 


ical  authority  and  thus  became  the  source  of  the  Scholasticism 
of  the  Middle  Ages;  while  the  continuation  of  the  inner  control 
factor  of  the  Neo-lMatonic  symbolism  became  the  source  of  the 
Mysticism  of  the  same  period.  1  he  tracing  out  of  the  develop- 
ment of  these  two  streams  of  thought  with  the  emphasis  how- 
ever upon  the  former  is  the  matter  of  present  concern. 

In  its  organization  the  church  made  free  use  of  material 
which  represented  the  generalization  of  a  past  experience,  so 
that  from  the  standpoint  of  the  content  of  its  organization  the 
church  represented  a  mixture  of  Greek  and  Jewish  elements. 
The  idea  of  God  was  made  transcendent  and  the  doctrine  of 
divine  election  is  only  the  carrying  over  of  the  old  Greek  ideas 
of  aristocracy  into  the  realm  of  the  spiritual.'  Ihis  transcen- 
dent view^  of  things  contributed  to  the  separation  and  sharpen- 
ing of  the  spiritual  from  the  sensuous.  But  as  thus  organized 
out  of  materials  that  represented  the  generalization  of  a  past 
experience,  the  kingdom  is  still  interpreted  outwardly,  so  that 
both  the  thought  and  the  conduct  of  the  Middle  Ages  terminate 
on  an  existence  which  lies  beyond  both.-  The  real  treasures  of 
earth  still  lie  beyond  it,  and  the  kingdom  rliat  is  to  be,  already  is, 
and  at  a  later  day  shall  descend  as  the  New  Jerusalem  from  the 
clouds.  The  Church  of  the  West  was  thus  organized  upon  a 
thoroughly  transcendental  basis. 

But  having  taken  under  her  charge  the  highest  interests  of 
the  individual,  the  Church  at  once  proceeds  to  take  control  of 
the  State.  The  separation  of  Church  and  State  referred  to  as 
representing  the  ethical  climax  of  antiquity  is  to  be  undone  by 
bringing  the  two  realms  under  a  common  organization  with 
Rome  as  its  center  and  the  bishop  of  Rome  as  its  common  head. 

Nevertheless,  the  attempted  union  of  Church  and  State  con- 
tributed to  the  farther  isolation  and  deepening  of  the  inner  as 
the  second  aspect  of  the  Neo-IMatonic  symbolism.  The  individ- 
ual sought  the  Church  because  the  State  as  the  existing  outer 
failed  him  when  most  needed.  The  ideas  an^und  which  the 
doctrines  of  the  Church  gathered  represented  a  generalization  of 

'  Cf.  Nash,  Genfsis  of  the  Soi  lul  Cnnsitnuf,  ch.  ii. 

'  Cf.  Baldwin,  'Sketch  of  the  History  of  I'sychology,'  Psychological  Review, 
Vol.  XII,  1905. 


NEO-PLATONISM  JXD  EARLY  MrSTICISM.  95 

a  stage  of  knowledge  alreatlv  outgrown,  hence  the  struggle 
between  the  Nominalists  and  the  Realists.  In  fact,  both  as 
regards  external  organization  and  inner  content,  the  Church 
stood  above  the  individual,  with  the  result  that  the  individual 
is  once  more  thrown  back  upon  himself  and  compelled  to  go 
beyond  the  Church  for  the  expression  and  realization  of  his 
ideas  and  aspirations.  The  age  was  characterized  by  the 
increasing  presence  and  number  of  Saints,  Knight-errants  and 
Magicians.  The  growth  of  Monasticism,  as  a  Church  within  the 
Church,  kept  pace  with  the  increasing  secularization  of  the 
Church  Universal,  and  within  monastic  walls,  were  in  process 
of  forming  the  ideas  and  ideals  which  at  a  later  period  burst 
forth  and  became  the  formative  principles  of  modern  culture 
and  religion. 

At  this  time  were  produced  the  great  epics  of  the  German 
people — "Creations  alive  with  all  the  stir  and  strife  of  the  time, 
retaining  an  afterslow^  of  the  oldest  mythical  traditions  but 
strangely  tinged  with  the  recent  historical  experiences,  repre- 
senting the  old  Germanic  ideas  of  uprightness,  devotion  and 
Hdelitv,  but  also  the  loosening  of  all  social  bonds  and  the  rule 
of  vile  passions  brought  about  by  this  age  of  revolt."^ 

By  the  ninth  century  the  work  of  subjugation  and  conquest 
was  completed.  'The  greedy,  untrained  individual  of  the  North 
had  drunk  the  wine  and  eaten  the  food  of  the  Graeco-Roman 
civilization.'-  The  authoritative  truth  contained  in  the  mediae- 
val Church  and  State  had  accomplished  its  work  of  disciplining 
the  untrained  masses.  What  was  at  first  purely  outer  has  now 
become  inner  in  the  sense  that  the  individual  has  made  it  his 
own.  By  a  process  of  imitative  absorption,  the  rude  conqueror 
of  the  Roman  world,  has  in  turn,  been  captured  by  it,  and  a 
new  civilization  arises.  But  in  the  process  of  absorption,  the 
appetites  and  impulses  of  the  individual  of  the  North,  wiide 
controlled  are  not  destroyed  bur  (juickened,  so  that  he  at  once 
comes  to  make  increased  demands  of  materials  which  have  been 
so  fully  and  faithfully  doled  out  to  him.      The  immediacy  of 

'  Francke,  loc.  cit.,  p.  16. 

'  Dewey,  'Significance  of  the  Problem  of  Knowledge,'  University  of  Chicago 
Contributions  to  Philosophy,  No.  Ill  (1897). 


96  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

snnuilus  :incl  response,  ot  iiionvc  aiul  guarantee  of  thought  and 
conduct,  is  again  broken  down,  and  the  individual  of  (lermanic 
origin,  no  less  than  the  Graeco-Ronian  individual,  must  seek 
these  bevond  the  Church-State  community  of  which  he  is  now 
a  member. 

That  the  burden  of  metaphysical  discussion  has  shifted 
from  the  ontological  to  the  epistemological — from  the  outer  to 
the  inner —  is  to  be  inferred  from  the  character  of  the  philosophy 
of  Saint  Augustine.  The  Confessions  is  significant  as  indicat- 
ing the  rise  and  potency  of  the  principle  of  individuality.  The 
placing  of  psychology  in  the  very  fore-front  of  his  philost)ph\' 
and  his  making  will  the  chief  factor  of  conscious  life,  are  fur- 
ther illustrations  of  the  change  of  attitude  toward  the  inner.  It 
will  be  recalled  that  with  Socrates,  thought  ami  will  were  com- 
pletely identified.  To  know  is  to  do;  and  sin  is  a  matter  of 
ignorance.  Aristotle  made  the  will  more  central,  but  in  the 
end  his  conception  of  the  will  is  made  to  conform  to  his  con- 
ception of  the  Deity.  The  emanational  and  dualistic  con- 
ceptions of  antiquity  are  the  necessary  conclusions  of  a  static 
view  of  things.  "Pagan  antiquity"  Baur  says,  "never  got 
beyond  the  antithesis  of  matter  and  spirit  and  could  not  con- 
ceive a  world  produced  b;-  the  free  creative  activity  of  a  purely 
personal  will."'  With  both  Plato  and  Aristotle  and  the  Post- 
Aristotelians,  including  the  Theologians  of  the  Church,  the  out- 
ward movement  of  thought  into  a  reality  already  determined, 
rather  than  the  treatment  of  the  inner  receives  the  emphasis. 
The  large  place  assigned  the  will  by  the  learned  Bishop  of  Hippo 
illustrates  the  passage  of  thought  from  a  static  to  a  more  dynamic 
conception.  Phe  relations  obtaining  between  God  and  the 
w'orld  come  to  be  regarded  from  the  ethical  point  of  view. 
"The  peculiarity  of  Christian  philosophy"  sa\s  Windclband, 
"consisted  essentially  in  this,  that  in  its  apprehension  of  the 
relations  between  God  and  the  World  it  sought  to  employ 
throughout  the  ethical  point  of  view  of  a  free  creative  action." 
1  he  Greek  conception  of  an  uncreated  matter  is  Ipart  of  a  dual- 
ism which  may  be  refined  but  never  reconciled  with  tlu-  other 

'  I'aur,  Church  History,  Vol.  I,  p.   193. 


NEO-PLATONISM  AXD  EARLY  MISTICISM.  97 

term  of  the  dualism,  while  the  presence  of  an  unreconciled 
dualism,  means  the  presence  of  some  element  in  the  universe 
that  successfully  withstands  the  intellectual  and  ethical  process.* 
But  the  conception  of  the  freedom  of  God  and  the  creation  of  the 
world  as  the  outcome  of  a  purposive  act  of  a  holy  will,  places  at 
once  the  dualism  of  form  and  matter,  of  ideal  and  actual,  in 
such  relations  to  each  other,  that  their  reconciliation  becomes 
the  burden  of  philosophic  discussion. 

It  is  interesting  to  observe  that  the  development  of  the  sub- 
jective and  the  dynamic  view  of  the  world  arise  and  develop 
together.  The  conception  of  the  freedom  of  God,  as  embodied 
and  illustrated  in  the  creation  and  maintenanceof  the  world,  drew 
after  it  the  conception  of  the  freedom  of  the  individual.  Still, 
human  freedom  was  regarded  as  a  divine  gift,  rather  than  a 
natural  attribute.  The  soul  is  not  a  gift  but  a  task,  while  free- 
dom no  longer  implies  the  identification  of  the  real  and  the 
ideal  but  the  opportunity  for  the  most  perfect  realization  of  the 
individual.  Hitherto  the  summum  bonum  represented  the 
unchanging  nature  of  things  and  virtue  was  only  a  capacity  for 
its  contemplation.  But  the  highest  good  is  now  an  nifimte 
force  rather  than  a  fixed  quantity.  The  realm  of  thought  and 
conduct  is  not  a  completed  and  static  universe  in  which  means 
and  end  are  identical,  but  a  historic  process  in  which  the  two 
aspects  are  correlative  and  determining  factors.  The  old-time 
dualism  of  form  and  matter,  the  actual  and  the  potential,  still 
remains  but  finds  now  a  new  basis  within  the  individual. 

The  limitation  of  the  thought  of  Saint  Augustine  is  to  be 
seen  in  the  fact  that  he  holds  the  Church  before  iiim  always  as 
the  ultimate  criterion,  while  at  the  same  time,  he  gathers  all  his 
ideas  about  the  absolute  and  immediate  certainty  of  conscious- 
ness. Althoucht  a  virtuoso  in  self-observation  and  self-analy- 
sis,  his  separation  of  the  soul  from  the  body,  the  individual  from 
the  universal,  was  motived  by  theological  and  practical 
purposes.     The  individual  as  erected  by  Augustine  was  wholly 


The  identifying  of  the  Absolute  experience  with  unformed  matter,  thus  mak- 
ing the  Absolute  matter  without  form,  was  the  outcome  of  Neo-Platonism. 
Cf.  also  the  Absolute  of  Herbert  Spencer. 


98  THE  AESTHETIC  EXI'EKIEXCE. 

religious  in  character.  The  idea  of  God  is  immediately  involved 
in  whatever  certainty  the  mdividual  consciousness  has  of  itself. 
Hut  he  also  insists  that  the  essence  of  truth  is  its  existence, 
and  smce  truth  is  absolutelv  incorporeal,  it  can  only  be  thought 
as  the  ideas  of  God  after  a  Neo-Platonic  fashion.  All  rational 
knowledge  is  thus  knowledge  of  God.  The  relation  of  the 
individual  to  truth  is  therefore  passive  and  receptive;  hence  it 
can  be  reached  only  throui^h  a  process  of  illumination  or  reve- 
lat 


ion 


1 


Ii  is  thus  seen  that  the  issue  of  the  two  types  of  thought  in 
Augustine,  the  metaphysical  and  the  theological,  is  the  dualism 
of  the  individual  and  the  universal  whose  reconciliation  extends 
far  into  the  Middle  Ages.  Saint  Augustine  however  found  the 
secret  of  the  unification  of  experience,  not  in  the  restless  activity 
of  the  will  with  IMotinus,  but  in  the  rest  of  contemplation,  an 
experience  into  which  the  individual  after  the  struggles  and 
exertions  of  the  present  life  are  over  may  enter  and  by  becoming 
absorbed  in  the  divine  truth  mav  once  more  enioy  the  perfect 
identity  of  the  divine  and  the  human,  the  individual  and  the 
universal. - 

By  the  middle  of  the  tenth  century  is  seen  fur  the  first  time 
in  tile  history  of  the  Western  world  a  distinctly  German  State, 
which  is  not  only  able  to  maintain  its  own  identity,  but  has 
already  entered  upon  that  struggle  against  the  Church,  out  of 
which  the  modern  individual  is  to  emerge.  Within  this  long 
drawn-out  struggle  is  produced  a  literature  which  is  significant 
as  indicating  the  effective  working  of  the  two  contrasting  tend- 
encies,  nor  onh'  in  literature,  but  in  life  as  a  whole.  1>\'  the 
end  of  the  twelfth  century  and  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth, 
mediaeval  society  was  at  its  height.  Ihe  long  struggle  between 
the  Church  and  the  Kmpire  assumed  its  largest  proportions  and 
out  of  it  there  issued  the  most  signal  expressions  of  a  collective 
consciousness.  liu-  whole  national  existence  had  JH-en  (juick- 
cned  and  deepened  by  the  Crusades  and  attempts  are  everywiure 
made  to  give  expression  to  the  fulness  of  human  nature.     Chiv- 

'  God  is  above  all  that  may  he  said  of  Him;  He  is  he.st  known    hy  nescience, 
best  described  by  negatives.     De.  Trin,  VH,  7;  De  Civ.  Dei,  IX,  16. 

'£/>.,  120,  20;  De  OrJ.,  H,  16,  42,  59;  Cow/.,  \'!ll,  10  (Bigg's  translation). 


NE0-PL.1T0.XISM  .1\D  EARLV  MrSTICISM.  99 

alrv  has  become  rlic  recognized  foundation  of  public  life.  "In 
the  Minnesong;  in  the  re)uvenated  and  transformed  Cierman 
Epic  of  the  Migration  period;  in  the  adaptation,  through  the 
medium  of  the  French,  of  the  Celtic  and  Graeco-Roman  tradi- 
tions, the  chivalric  ideal  receives  its  poetical  expression."' 

Throughout  the  entire  period,  from  the  ninth  to  the  thir- 
teenth centurv,  the  most  striking  characteristic  is  the  attempt 
upon  the  part  of  the  individual  to  reach  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
culture  of  the  age  as  contained  in  the  Church  and  State — a  sort 
of  divHK-  anticipation  of  a  new  social  order.  Once  more  as  in 
the  days  of  Socrates,  the  individual  can  no  longer  hnd  the 
motives  and  sanctions  of  conduct  within  the  community  of 
which  he  is  a  member.  Whde  corporate  life  is  still  the  chief 
concern  of  the  individual  there  is  everywhere  to  be  seen  the 
development  of  the  spirit  of  self-assertiveness  which  will  later 
bring  about  the  dissolution  of  the  present  regime.  "In  the 
directness  of  the  \'olklied  and  its  subjectivity;  in  the  sturdy 
realism  of  the  religious  drama;  in  the  glorification  of  the  inner 
union  between  God  and  the  soul  by  the  Mystics;  in  the  procla- 
mation bv  the  Humanists  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  individual 
intellect  we  see  the  different  phases  of  that  revolt  against  medi- 
aeval society  which  culminated  in  the  religious    Reformation. "- 

With  the  twofold  movement  called  on  its  religious  side  the 
Reformation  and  on  its  secular  the  Renascence,  the  individual, 
freed  himself  from  the  immediate  past.  "The  sum  of  the 
whole  matter  is"  says  Nash,  "  that  the  individual  fashioned  by 
the  combined  influences  of  the  Graeco-Roman  I'mpire  and  the 
Bible,  drilled  in  the  monastery,  called  forth  from  the  monastery 
by  the  revival  of  culture  and  religion  on  the  one  hand  and  by 
the  growing  power  of  the  State  on  the  other,  stood  free  in  the 
open  held  of  history."^  Having  thus  risen  above  the  ideas  that 
had  been  handed  down  to  him  from  the  past,  by  regarding  them 
as  material  available  for  personal  treatment,  the  probkni  of 
the  reconciliation  of  a  dualistic  consciousness  is  once  again  the 
urgent   problem   of  speculation.      1  lie   fact  that  consciousness 

'  Francke,  Social  Forces  of  German  Literature,  p.  45. 

'  Frnncke,  op.  cit.,  p.  52. 

^  Nash,  Genesis  of  the  Social  Conscience,  p.  259. 


100  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIES'CE. 

now  distinguishes  itself  from  the  materials  of  its  manipulation, 
presents  a  problem  not  hitherto  found.  The  atmosphere 
became  one  of  invention — the  search  after  control  over  natural 
forces.  The  Renascence  placed  at  the  command  of  the  individ- 
ual the  resources  of  the  ancient  world  which  by  contributing  to 
the  deepening  of  his  intellectual  powers,  also  enabled  him  to 
free  himself.  The  Reformation  contributed  to  the  quickening 
of  his  conscience  so  that  with  quickened  will  and  intellect  the 
individual  goes  forth  to  create  his  own  world. 

The  individual  thus  become  self-confident  and  self-assertive 
reduces  authority  to  a  matter  of  individual  opinion.  The  exter- 
nal world  thus  freed  from  the  element  of  caprice  and  animation 
is  gradually  reduced  to  an  order  in  which  law  reigns  with 
mechanical  exactness  and  rigidity.  The  earlv  Italian  philoso- 
phers of  nature  re-stated  the  pressing  and  vital  problem  of  meta- 
physics in  terms  of  nature  rather  than  God — from  the  stand- 
point of  philosophy  rather  than  religion.  Many  of  them  were 
persecuted  by  the  Church  but  their  influence  is  to  be  traced 
throughout  the  whole  of  modern  thought. 

Along  with  the  pantheistic  conception  of  the  physical  world 
there  go  also  the  secularization  of  religion  and  the  deification  of 
the  State.  The  spirit  of  the  Renascence  was  concerned  with  the 
present  order  of  things  and  led  to  deification  of  both  State  and 
Nature.  The  inner,  as  the  creative  self,  seeks  to  embody  itself 
in  a  new  principle  of  world  interpretation  and  world  recon- 
struction, and  as  opposed  to  the  religious-philosophical  view  of 
the  Middle  Ages,  which  is  every\vhere  in  process  of  dissolution, 
seeks  to  establish  what  has  been  named  a  natural-philosophical 
view  of  the  world.  "The  spirit  of  the  Western  people,"  says 
Windelband,  "has  now  taken  up  into  itself  the  entire  material 
wliich  the  past  offers  for  its  culture,  and  in  feverish  excitement 
into  which  it  is  finally  put  by  direct  contact  with  the  highest 
achievements  of  ancient  science  it  struggles  upward  toward  the 
attainment  of  complete  independence."  One  feels  the  impulsive 
blood  of  youth  pulsate  in  its  literature  as  though  something 
unheard  of,  something  which  had  never  before  been  must  now 
come  into  being.  The  men  of  the  Renascence  announce  to  us 
nothing  less  than  the  approach  of  a  total  renovation  of  science 


NEO-PLJTONISM  AND  EARLY  MYSTICISM.  lOI 

and  ot  the  state  of  liunianitv.  The  warfare  between  the  trans- 
mitted  doctrines  leads  to  a  surfeit  of  the  past;  learned  research 
into  the  old  wisdom  ends  with  throwing  aside  all  book-rubbish, 
and  full  of  the  youthful  joy  of  dawning  life  the  mind  goes  forth 
into  the  cosmic  life  of  nature  ever  }oung.' 

The  outcome  of  the  entire  movement  of  the  thought  of  the 
Middle  Ages  was  the  absorption  in  the  inner  world  of  the  life  of 
the  soul.-  Within  the  Graeco-Roman  world,  interest  in  the 
inner  was  determined  by  its  relations  to  the  outer.  Through- 
out the  Middle  Ages,  on  the  contrary,  the  fate  of  the  individual 
vv^as  determined  by  the  development  of  the  inner  life.  The 
spiritual  world  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  abode  of  the  individ- 
ual and  to  which  was  ascribed  as  much  reality  as  to  the  world 
of  matter.  The  grand  outcome  of  the  whole  movement  of 
thought  during  the  Middle  Ages,  is  the  bringing  forward  of  the 
materials  and  motives  of  the  mind-bodv  dualism,  whose  recon- 
ciliation was  at  once  undertaken,  but  which  was  hindered  by  the 
lack  of  a  free  and  comprehensive  treatment  of  the  world  of 
Nature. 

The  religious  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth  century  is  to  be 
regarded  as  the  expression  of  individuality  in  matters  religious. 
The  Church  was  no  longer  able  to  mediate  between  the  individ- 
ual and  the  sources  of  all  spiritual  values.  He  now  asserted  the 
right  to  touch  the  eternal  without  the  mediation  of  another. 
Thus  as  Nash  says,  "The  idea  of  God  came  forth  in  unveiled 
majesty  to  wed  itself  to  the  idea  of  the  individual."'  This 
means  that  the  individual  is  now  rated  high  and  has  the  hic:hest 
good  opened  to  him.  But  the  Church  makes  a  final  attempt 
to  withstand  the  new  thoughts  and  ideals  by  fortifying  its  own 
traditions  and  at  the  Council  of  Trent  made  the  philosophy  of 
St.  Thomas  eternally  valid  and  binding.  Luther,  on  the  con- 
trary, attempted  to  re-establish  primitive  Christianity  as  against 
Catholicism  and  went  back  to  St.  Augustine  for  guidance  and 
authority.  Thus  by  these  two  tendencies  and  systems  of 
thought,   the   metaphysics   of  the    Middle    Ages    was    split    in 

'  Francke,  op.  cit.,  p.  60. 

'  HofFding,  History  of  Modern  Philosophy,  \'ol.  I,  Imr. 

'  Nash,  op.  cit.,  ch.  viii. 


102  THE  .1  ESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

twain.  10  clo^nia  is  nssic;ncd  the  wliole  realm  of  the  super- 
sensuous  while  thf  world  of  experience  is  reserved  for  philosophy. 
But  hefore  thought  liad  time  to  come  to  itself  and  to  appreciate 
the  problem  hefore  it,  and  the  necessary  method  of  solution, 
the  whole  Platonic  fVtltnnschauung  came  in  and  philosophy  at 
once  turned  from  theology  to  natural  science.  The  epistem- 
ological  problem  which  thus  presented  itself  for  solution,  the 
problem  of  the  Macrocosm  and  the  Microcosm,  was  solved  in 
the  light  of  the  imaginative  conception  of  the  divine  unity  ot  the 
Living  All. 

In  many  respects  the  epistemological  problem  of  the  two 
Platonic  periods  shows  marks  of  similarity.  I  hen  as  now  the 
characteristic  problem  was  the  merging  of  two  contrasted  forms 
of  control  in  some  form  of  immediacy  of  consciousness.  1  he 
symbolism  of  Plotinus  was  seen  to  be  an  imitative  or  experi- 
mental treatment  of  materials  under  definite  guarantees  of  deter- 
mination with  reference  to  the  fulfilment  of  inner  purpose.  Rur 
after  Plotinus,  the  element  of  Mysticism  was  ignored  and  the 
ideas  of  the  Graeco-Roman  world  became  the  motive  and  sanc- 
tion of  conduct  and  thought.  But  the  clement  of  immediacy, 
as  seen  in  the  Neo-Platonic  Mysticism,  continues  its  develop- 
ment and  is  especially  seen  in  the  increasing  appreciation  of 
external  nature  which  sometmies  approaches  the  modern. 
Referring  to  this  aspect  of  appreciation,  Bosanquet  says,  that  it 
"  Emphasizes  unmistakably  a  new  attitude  of  aesthetic  perception 
to  external  nature  the  like  of  which  we  have  not  found  in  any 
Hellenic  or  Graeco-Roman  writer."' 

Defining  the  epistemological  problem  ot  the  age  as  the  uni- 
fication of  experience  by  the  reconciliation  ot  the  subjective  and 
the  external  it  is  at  once  seen  that  Mysticism  became  the  organ 
of  world  unitication  and  interpretation.  In  the  work  of  Bruno 
is  to  be  found  the  most  characteristic  products  of  the  period  of 
the  Renascence.  In  him  the  enthusiasm  tor  natural  beauty 
which  had  long  been  held  in  abe\  aiue  became  an  all-absorbing 
passion.  The  investigations  of  Tycho  Brahe,  Copernicus, 
Galilei  and  Kepler  produced  a  profound  impression  upon  the 

'  Hist,  of  Aesthetics,  p.  129. 


NEO-PLJTONISM  .1X1)  EARLV  MYSTICISM.  I03 

human  mind  and  made  impossible  the  holding  any  longer  of 
the  narrow  and  earrh-ccntered  theological  views  of  the  universe. 
The  earth  is  round  and  moves  and  God  can  no  longer  be  con- 
ceived as  having  His  local  dwelling  in  the  heavens.  A  wholly 
new  way  of  looking  at  the  world  has  now  come  into  the  human 
mind,  and  along  with  the  conception  of  a  new  and  vaster  uni- 
verse comes  also  the  conviction  that  it  can  be  grasped  as  a  whole. 
The  absolute  unity  of  all  knowledge  and  being  is,  however, 
inaccessible  to  human  reason  and  must  therefore,  become  an 
object  of  faith.  The  problem  of  thought  thus  becomes  the 
elevating  of  itself  from  the  confused  and  chaotic  manifold  of 
sense-experience  to  the  unity  present  in  all  things.  The  aes- 
thetic character  of  the  attempted  solution  of  the  problem  thus 
presented  is  to  be  seen  in  the  Hylozoistic  character  of  the  philoso- 
phy of  Bruno.  All  nature  becomes  alive.  A  world-soul  per- 
vades everything.  Looking  out  upon  the  world,  man  every- 
where beholds  the  embodiment  and  working  of  a  powTr  like 
to  himself,  'nearer  than  breathing  and  closer  than  hands  and 
^tti,'  yet  present  in  the  remotest  star-spaces  and  informing  all 
things.  The  distinction  between  the  human  and  the  divine  is  no 
longer  tenable.  Reality  is  an  eternal  spirit,  one  and  indivisible, 
from  which  all  things  flow  and  of  which  all  thin2:s  are  only 
images.  Within  rhis  whole  all  differences  disappear.  As 
opposed  to  the  abstract  unity  of  Spinoza,  Bruno  insists  that  God 
is  the  whole,  present  in  every  individual  thing  and  present  as  a 
whole.  Man,  as  an  individual,  is  a  mirror  within  a  mirror, 
whose  perception  of  things  is  only  a  reflection  of  narurr  which 
in  turn  is  a  reflection  of  the  thought  of  God. 

The  problem  of  knowledge  becomes  with  Bruno  the  prob- 
lem of  the  identification  of  the  microcosm  and  the  macrocosm. 
How  is  it  possible  for  any  particular  aspect  of  the  whole  to  reflect 
the  whole  of  which  it  is  an  aspect .''  It  is  sufficient  to  indicate 
that  the  problem  as  thus  stated  was  solved  by  making  a  sort  of 
subjective  leap  beyond  the  actual  limits  of  knowledge.  As  in 
the  earlier  periods,  so  once  more,  the  individual  explains  his 
world  by  projecting  himself  into  all  the  phenomena  perceived. 
Reason  failing.  Mysticism  as  an  immediacy  of  feeling  becomes 
the   sole   resource.     "The  world-joy  of    the   aesthetic    Renas- 


104  ^^^  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

cence,"  says  Wincklband,  "sinp;s  philosophical  dithvrambs  in 
the  writings  of  Bruno  and  a  universalistic  optimism  that  carries 
everything  before  it  prevails  in  his  thought."' 

In  the  philosophic  thought  of  Jacob  Bohme,  as  Windelband 
points  out,  Neo-Platonic  Mvsticism  is  given  complete  religious 
coloring.  As  against  the  hvlozoistic  unity  of  Bruno,  Bohme 
posits  a  duality  from  the  beginning.  Strife  is  the  mother  of  all 
things.  Things notfallingunderone  oranotherof  these  terms  are 
dead.  The  world  becomes  thus  the  conflict  between  two  oppos- 
ing forces,  a  conflict  ending  only  at  death.  Antithesis  is  the  law 
of  being,  and  in  'ves'  and  *no'  all  things  consist.  Activity  con- 
notes a  dualism,  but  every  dualism  is  harmonized  in  the  divine 
nature.  This  struggle  is  also  present  within  the  experience  of 
every  individual.  Salvation  means  escape  from  this  struggle 
which  can  be  secured  only  by  a  desire  within  the  soul  for  God. 
It  is  at  this  point  that  Bohme  makes  use  of  the  doctrine  of  the 
'Divine  Spark,'  a  doctrine  that  at  once  suggests  the  Platonic 
doctrine  of  'rha/ryrjat^*  only  put  in  Christian  language.  The 
moral  struggle  that  characterizes  human  experience  is  due  to  a 
power  within,  for  'what  could  begin  to  deny  self,  if  there  were 
not  something  in  man  different  from  self.'"-  Still  the  self  is  lost, 
as  it  were,  in  the  supernaturallv  determined  order  of  things. 
For  its  freedom  from  a  self-perceived  bondage  the  soul  must 
wait  for  the  time,  'the  time  of  the  lilies'  as  Bohme  calls  it,  when 
all  nature  will  be  delivered.  Thus  it  is  to  be  said  with  Inge  that 
the  "dim  sympathy  of  the  human  spirit  with  the  life  of  nature 
which  Plotinus  felt  but  which  mediaevalism  had  almost 
quenched,  has  now  become  an  intense  and  happy  consciousness 
of  community  with  all  living  things  as  subjects  of  one  all- 
embracing  and  unchanging  law,  the  law  of  perfect  love;"' and 
with  Hoffdinsi  that  Bohme's  thoujihts  have  traveled  far  from 
those  of  a  distinctly  religious  man,  so  that  it  is  no  small  wonder 
that  his  mythologic  fancy  completely  overpowered  his  thought 
at  this  point.'*     Despite  the  far-reaching  assumptions  found  in 

'  Windilband,  Hist,  of  Philosophy,  p.  368. 

'  Overton,  Life  of  ff'illiam  Lou.'. 

'  Inpc,  Christian   M \sticisiri,  p.   285. 

*  HollJing,  Hist,  of  Mod.  Phil.,   Vol.  I,  p.  80. 


NEO-PLATOXISM  JXD  EARLY  MYSTICISM.  I05 

the  begilnning  of  his  speculations,  he  was  unable  to  carry  them 
through  and  in  common  with  the  thinkers  of  his  age  finds  refuge 
from  the  limitations  of  thought  in  an  immediacy  of  conscious- 
ness in  which  by  a  process  of  divine  illumination  the  world  of 
opposites  as  distinguished  by  thought  is  united  and  the  individ- 
ual moves  about  in  a  world  of  his  own  determination. 

The  epistemological  problem  of  the  age  under  discussion 
was  the  erection  of  a  world  in  which  thought  and  conduct  could 
find  sanction  and  support  in  the  midst  of  a  world  fast  slipping 
from  beneath  the  individual's  feet.  The  self  as  the  inner, 
organizing  principle  has  risen  above  the  established  order  of 
things,  because  of  its  increasing  failure,  and  seeks  in  terms  of 
feeling  to  erect  one  more  permanent  and  satisfying.  The  pan- 
theism of  Bruno  is  wholly  hylozoistic,  the  attempt  to  unify  and 
explain  the  world  in  terms  of  the  self,  but  a  hylozoism  character- 
ized bv  the  presence  of  reflective  aspects  whollv  lacking  in  the 
earlier  attempts  in  the  same  direction.  The  Mystics  assert  the 
immanence  of  God  without  qualification.  In  both  attempts 
there  is  a  complete  identification  of  the  two  worlds  now  fallen 
apart  in  consciousness.  Both  attempts  are  to  be  regarded  as 
attempted  embodiments  of  the  self  gradually  freeing  itself  from 
some  aspect  of  its  content.  Thus  the  period  of  philosophic 
thought  under  discussion  proceeded  from  the  immediacy  secured 
in  Neo-Flatonic  Mvsticism,  through  the  dualism  of  a  Microcosm, 
with  its  ideal  struggling  for  realization,  and  a  Macrocosm  in  which 
that  ideal  is  conceived  as  completely  realized  of  the  Renascence, 
and  reached  another  immediacy  through  the  merging,  of  a 
dualistic  experience  in  terms  of  an  aesthetic  construction. 


Chapter  \'1II. 

Modcrti  Philosophy  from  Descartes  to  Kant  and  the  German 

Mystics,  as  Illustrating  the  Rise  and  Development 

of  the  Subject-Object  Dualism,  together  with 

the  Use  of  the  Aesthetic  Consciousness  as 

an    Epistemological  'Postulate.' 

Descartes  and  the  Cartesians. 

The  primary  assumpiion  of  Descartes,  that  of  the  duahsm  of 
mind  and  body,  is  but  the  expression  of  what  had  already  been 
worked  out  in  the  consciousness  of  the  individual.  In  Greek 
thought  the  individual  and  the  universal  were  wholly  identified 
because  of  the  a-dualistic  character  of  consciousness.  Throuiih- 
out  the  Middle  Ages  the  attempt  was  made  to  retain  this  old- 
time  immediacy  by  making  the  individual  wholly  dependent 
upon  the  universal  as  organized  in  the  Church.  But  the 
attempt  to  unify  the  individual  with  the  universal  by  making 
the  latter  transcendent  only  contributed  to  the  isolation  and 
deepening  of  the  individual.  In  the  attempt  to  make  the 
general  notions  of  Aristotle  sufficient  and  valid  for  all  eternity, 
the  Church  prepared  the  instruments  of  its  own  overthrow. 
Authority  failed  finally  to  compensate  the  meagerness  ot  ideas. 
The  manipulation  of  these  general  notions  had  reached  per- 
fection and  it  was  useless  to  go  over  the  field  again.  Thought 
must  therefore  find  new  fields  of  operation  and  as  Professor 
Dewey  says,  Galiki  and  Copernicus  were  as  truly  travelers  as 
Marco  Polo  and  Christopher  Colombo.  "Inventio  rather  than 
judicium,  discovery  rather  than  proof,  became  the  burden  of  the 
age."  The  outcome  of  this  search  after  a  method  of  manipula- 
tion was  the  separation  of  the  individual  and  the  universal,  so 
that  by  carrying  over  to  the  realm  of  the  outer  what  was  once 
inner  and  the  making  of  it  material  for  imitative  treatment,  the 
inner  now  possessed  of  a  persistency  of  its  own  is  also  to  be 

1 06 


MODERN  PHILOSOPHT  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  KANT.  107 

reckoned  with  as  outer,  but  clirtLiinii;  in  its  content  and  control 
from  the  orii^inal  outer. 

But  whde  Descartes  nia\  be  said  to  haNe  iienerah/ed  the 
motives  of  his  ao;e  he  failed  to  treat  the  mind  term  of  the  dualism 
as  under  continuous  and  ordered  change.'  lie  did  not  establish 
his  psychology  upon  the  facts  ot  experience.  The  poles  of  the 
dualism  are  not  distinctions  tailing  within  consciousness  but  are 
two  whollv  opposed  and  disparate  spheres  of  existence.  The 
assumption  of  mind  and  bodv  is  both  realistic  aiul  dogmatic. 
As  an  individual  Descartes  is  unable  to  break  with  the  Church 
and  accepts  its  dogma  as  it  came  floating  down  to  him.  While 
he  made  it  the  fundamental  rule  of  his  life  to  look  within  for 
the  criterion  of  thought  and  conduct  and  even  boasted  of  beinc 
self-educated,  the  objective  world  still  finds  its  guarantee  in 
the  veracity  of  God. 

The  more  positive  and  naturalistic  treatment  of  the  outer 
world  made  possible  by  the  advance  of  the  physical  and 
mathematical  sciences,  with  which  Descartes  shows  himself  to 
have  been  familiar,  did  not  serve,  however,  to  detach  the  inner 
from  the  outer  and  bring  it  under  like  treatment.  The  advance 
made  by  Descartes  in  the  solution  of  the  epistemological  prob- 
lem is  to  be  sought  in  his  assumption  of  the  subjective  as  the 
starting  point  of  all  scientific  in(]uir\'.  Immediate  conscious- 
ness thus  becomes  the  criterion  of  reality.  But  his  statement 
must  be  taken  as  representing  an  immediately  given  datum 
rather  than  the  validity  of  judgment.  Reflection,  as  issuing  in 
judgment,  must  be  brought  within  the  judgment  process  as 
involving  the  mutual  reference  of  subject  and  object.  The 
limitation  of  Descartes  is  to  be  inferred  from  his  surreptiti- 
ously introducing  the  object  into  the  subject,  rather  than  detach- 
ing the  subject.  Thus,  despite  his  efforts  to  the  contrary,  the 
philosophy  of  Descartes  begins  and  ends  with  a  dualistic  con- 
sciousness as  a  datum  of  immediate  experience. 

Modern  philosoph\',  dating  from  Descartes,  opens  with  a 
subjective  note.  The  individual  emptied  of  all  content  and 
given  a  self-centered  and  self-dependent  isolation  can  find  no 

'  Cf.    Baldwin,   St.    Louis   Aiiilrcss,   'Sketch   of  the  History  of  Psychology,' 
Psychological  Rnicic,  Vol.  XII. 


Io8  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

way  of  relating  itself  to  the  necessary  object  of  thought.  Accord- 
ins  to  Descartes,  to  exist  is  identical  with  to  think.  But  to 
think  is  to  think  something.  A  thinking  being  can  become  con- 
scious of  its  own  existence  and  identity  as  subject,  only  by 
knowledge  of  objects.  Thinking  involves  and  implies  the  rela- 
tion of  subject  and  object  and  to  assign  cither  an  independent 
existence  is  to  make  the  problem  of  knowledge  unsolvable. 
The  famous  dictum  of  Descartes,  from  which  modern  philosophy 
is  dated,  is  in  reality,  false,  since  it  represents  a  premature 
plunge  into  ontology  before  the  way  was  prepared  by  an  ade- 
quate theory  of  knowledge.'  Regarding  the  perceptions  and 
ideas  as  purely  inner,  that  is,  having  no  reference  beyond  the 
mind  having  them,  Descartes  prepared  the  way  for  a  subjective 
idealism.  Nevertheless  the  ideas  are  representative  of  things 
outside  the  mind,  that  is,  are  symbolic  of  something  beyond 
themselves,  which  aspect  alone  makes  them  ideas  and  deter- 
mines them  as  either  true  or  false. 

It  is  precisely  here  that  we  are  to  seek  for  the  epistemological 
problem  of  Descartes.  The  problem  at  once  arose  as  to  the 
reference  of  ideas  to  objects  or  defining  the  problem  in  our  own 
terms,  'how  can  the  ideas  as  unrelated  mental  facts  transcend 
themselves  .''  It  will  become  evident  later,  that  if  we  start  with 
a  self-contained  subject  we  shall  find  no  justification  whatever 
for  the  objective  reference  which  knowledge  implies  and  involves. 
It  is  evident  that  Descartes  appreciated  the  problematical  char- 
acter of  his  attempted  solution;  but  he  nevertheless  defends  the 
truth  of  his  position  by  reference  to  the  veracity  of  God.  The 
abstraction  of  the  thinking  substance  finds  its  counterpart  in  the 
abstraction  of  the  extended  substance.  The  original  whole  of 
consciousness  is  broken  up  into  two  inert  entities.  1  he  knowl- 
edge of  either  is  the  result  of  a  sort  of  mechanical  interaction 
between  the  two  substances  at  a  single  point  in  the  brain. 

The  limitations  of  the  contentions  of  Descartes  are  best  seen 
in  tlie  attempted  solution  of  Descartes'  dualism  by  the  later 
Cartesians.  Occasionalism,  which  is  only  Cartesianism  carried 
to  its  logical  conclusion,  denied  the  possibility  of  any  interaction 

•  Seth,  The  Scottish  Philosophy,  p.   12. 


MODERX  PHILOSOPHY  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  K.iXT.  109 

between  the  two  substances.  Between  nnnd  and  matter,  the 
extended  and  the  unextended,  there  is  an  impassable  gulf  which 
the  Deity  alone  can  bridge.  Malebranche  goes  farther  and 
holds  that  the  sole  object  of  knowledge  of  the  material  world  is 
the  idea  of  extension  which  we  know  only  by  virtue  of  our  union 
with  God  who  illumines  our  minds.  The  external  world  is  not 
known  to  exist  but  believed  to  exist  on  grounds  of  supernatural 
revelation.  God  thus  becomes  the  true  cause  of  our  ideas  apart 
from  whom  we  can  neither  perceive  nor  will.  We  see  things 
truly  only  as  w^e  see  them  in  Him.  The  outcome  of  the  philoso- 
phy of  Malebranche  was  the  simplication  of  the  Cartesian  prob- 
lem b\'  making  matter  non-existent,  so  that  our  belief  in  the 
reality  of  the  objective  order  is  rather  an  article  of  faith.' 

It  is  important  to  observe  in  passing  that  Malebranche  dis- 
tinguishes between  sensation,  which  is  of  the  nature  of  feeling, 
and  understanding.  The  former  is  a  subjective  process  only 
while  the  latter  is  constituted  of  the  clear  and  distinct  ideas 
which  arise  on  the  presentation  of  sense  objects.  These  ideas 
are,  however,  transcendent  so  far  as  the  individual  is  concerned 
and  are  thus  both  universal  and  objective.  Still  further  the 
ideas  have  to  do  only  with  the  essence  of  things,  while  the  sensa- 
tions are  concerned  with  the  particular  existences.  For  Male- 
branche the  epistemological  problem  arises  in  connection  with 
the  relation  between  the  ideas  and  the  particular  sensations. 
The  question  which  at  once  presents  itself,  is  as  to  the  passage 
from  the  particulars  of  sense  to  the  universality  and  objectivity 
of  ideas.  But  Malebranche  in  common  with  the  age  looked 
upon  the  mind  as  passive  rather  than  constructive,  so  that  there 
being  no  ascent  from  the  subjectivity  of  the  sensations  to  the 
objectivity  of  the  ideas  such  objectivity  must  be  given  the  mind 
from  without.  Here  Malebranche,  like  Pascal  and  Geulincx, 
only  brings  out  the  latent  mysticism  of  Descartes  in  insisting 
that  causal  efficacy  is  the  prerogative  of  the  Deity  only.  Hence 
God  is  the  true  cause  of  all  our  ideas  and  in  Him  all  things  are 
to  be  seen.  God  therefore  is  in  immediate  relations  with  every 
thinking  soul.      Ihc   mysticism  of  Malebranche  thus  becomes 

'  R.  .Adamson,  Develop,  of  Mod.  Phil.,  Vol.  I,  p.  52. 


no  THE  AESTHKTIC.   EXPF.P.JES'CE. 

an  iniiiicdiacy  ot  consciousness  ui  Nvhuh  rlie  tlualisni  of  sense 
and  idea  is  transcended  by  the  vision  in  wliich  all  things  are 
seen  in  God. 


Spin 


oza. 


Iloflding  makes  Spinoza  the  central  thinker  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  since  his  philosopln  represents  an  attempt  to 
reconcile  and  unifv  the  several  tendencies  of  the  thought  of  the 
age.  His  pantheism  represents  a  brilliant  attempt  to  merge 
the  mystical  and  the  mechanical,  the  scientific  and  the  teleo- 
logical  attitudes  of  thought  which  had  been  developing  together 
during  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries.  If  the  mysti- 
cism of  (leulincx  and  Malebranche  represent  attempts  to  solve 
the  epistemological  problem  set  by  the  dualism  of  Descartes  by 
merging  the  two  antipodal  worlds  in  an  immediacy  of  conscious- 
ness, the  pantheism  of  Spinoza  represents  a  similar  attempt  bv 
making  the  content  of  the  two  worlds  identical.  Mind  and  l^oth' 
are  aspects  of  one  and  the  same  reality.  The  Cartesian  pre- 
supposition that  all  things  exist  only  in  Ciod  becomes  the  chief 
corner  stone  of  the  dcx^rrme  of  Spinoza.  Extension  and 
thought,  mind  and  body,  are  not  two  substances,  but  ultimate 
attributes  of  one  substance.  Ihese  two  attributes  of  thouirht 
and  extension  are  regarded  as  antithetical  ways  of  looking  at 
the  one  substance  rather  than  antithetical  substances. 

Descartes  held  that  while  the  interaction  of  mind  and  body 
was  not  evident  it  was  nevertheless  actual.  For  Cieulincx  and 
Malebranche  the  interaction  was  occasional  rather  than  immedi- 
ate and  mediated  b\  the  will  of  the  Deity.  In  either  instance  it 
leaves  the  matter  ot  relation  of  mind  and  body  wholl\-  inexplic- 
able. Spinoza  at  once  denies  the  possibility  of  any  interaction 
whatsoever  between  mind  and  bodw  To  admit  an  interaction 
destroys  both  the  duality  and  the  substantialit\-  of  each.  There 
is  only  one  process  of  Incoming  and  the  material  and  the  spirit- 
ual are  but  two  aspects  of  the  one  necessar\'  process.  Particular 
things,  whether  thinking  or  extended,  are  but  modes  of  the  one 
eternal,  unitary  woiKl-ground.  Thus,  as  Falkenberir  has 
pointed  out.  necessity  in  Incoining,  n\\\\\  in  being,  mechanism 


MODERX  PHlLOSUl'Ur  FROM  DEi;CARTi:S  TU  KAST.  Ill 

and  pantheism,  represent  the  controUing  conceptions  in  the 
Spinozistic  scheme. 

Spinoza's  theory  of  knowledge  is  comparable  to  that  of 
Plotinus.  Tlie  mind's  first  knowledge  is  individual  and  frag- 
mentary To  acquire  more  perfect  and  adequate  knowledge 
the  mind  must  pass  beyond  the  individual  and  particular 
point  of  view.  To  reach  the  more  perfect  knowledge  Spinoza 
recognizes  two  stages:  first,  that  of  reason  (ratio)  b\'  the 
employment^of  which  we  come  to  know  the  essence  of  things. 
This  sort  of  knowledge  is  obtained  by  the  process  of  deduction 
and  is  therefore  mediate  in  character.  Rational  knowledge  is, 
however,  necessarily  incomplete,  as  Spinoza  holds,  because  it 
enables  us  to  arrive  only  at  a  partial  view  of  things  and  can  not 
lift  us  to  that  plane  of  knowledge  at  which  we  behold  all  things 
perfectly  unified,  sub  specie  aeternatis.  To  reach  the  point  at 
which  all  things  are  completely  unified  Spinoza  introduces  his 
second  stage  of  knowledge  which  he  calls  the  intuitive,  by 
which  we  proceed  not  inferentially  from  one  particular  to 
another  but  by  taking  a  comprehensive  view  of  all  reality  see 
things  in  the  light  of  the  principle  from  which  they  proceed. 
He  who  has  reached  this  point  of  view  says  Spinoza,  "evolves 
all  his  ideas  from  that  which  represents  the  origin  and  source 
of  all  nature,  so  that  the  idea  appears  to  be  the  source  of  all 
others." 

He  considers  intuitive  knowledire  the  highest,  not  because  it 
yielded  a  greater  speculative  insight  into  the  nature  ol  things, 
but  because  it  frees  the  soul  b\-  transcending  the  limitations  and 
imperfections  of  sense  experiences.  "He  aimed,"  says  Hotf- 
ding,"  at  the  highest  knowledge,  that  is,  the  most  intimate  union 
of  the  individual  and  tiie  universal,  of  the  particular  \\  irh  the 
sum  total  of  constant  relations,  and  succeeds  only  by  postulating 
an  intuition  which  reminds  us  now  of  the  artist's  conception, 
now  of  the  mystic's  vision  according  as  the  stress  is  placed  upon 
the  individual  or  the  universal  moment."' 


'  History  of  Mod.  Phil.,  Vol.  I,  p.  307.     Cf.  E.  Caird,  Evolution  of  Religion, 
Vol.  I,  pp.  104,  105;  ami  Ethics  (Klwes  trs.).  Pr.  \'.  41   and  Scholium. 


112  THE  AESTHETIC  EXFERIESCE. 

The  British  Development. 

The  empirical  movement,  which  found  its  hirgest  and  freest 
expression  in  llngland,  represents  a  series  of  attempts  to  recon- 
cile the  same  dualism  by  reducing  mind  to  matter.  As  opposed 
to  the  mystical  and  theoretical  character  of  Continental  philoso- 
phy, Hrirish  philosophy  Nvas  the  rather  positive  and  practical. 
The  thinkers  on  the  Continent  were  interested  rather  in  the 
form  of  thought,  while  the  English  thinkers  from  Locke  on 
were  interested  in  the  content  oi  thought.  Modern  epistem- 
ological  inquiry  is  usually  dated  from  Locke  and  it  is  quite 
true  that  the  Essay  gave  birth  and  currency  to  the  terms  and 
distinctions  of  modern  philosophy.  The  Essay  is  also  signifi- 
cant as  indicating  the  fact,  that  the  ideas  are,  for  the  first  time, 
detached  from  the  presuppositions  of  belief,  and  given  inde- 
pendent treatment.  In  Locke  we  have  the  first  approach  to  a 
more  subjective  treatment  of  the  mind  as  constituted  of  a  series 
of  ideas.  \u  the  fourth  book  of  the  Essay,  Locke  attempts  a 
theory  of  knowledge.  His  definition  of  knowledge  as  the  "per- 
ception of  the  agreement  or  disagreement  of  our  ideas,"  leads  at 
once  to  a  subjective  idealism.  But  Locke  attempts  to  save 
himself  by  insisting  that  some  of  our  ideas  are  'representative,' 
m  the  sense,  that  they  "exactly  resemble  the  modification  of 
matter  in  the  bodies  that  cause  such  perceptions  in  us."  These 
are  the  so-called  primary  qualities,  wliich  Locke  proceeds  to 
enumerate  as  solidity,  extension,  figure  etc.  The  patterns  of 
these  Locke  would  say  really  exist  in  the  bodies  themselves. 
But  in  the  case  of  sounds,  tastes,  etc.,  only  an  uninstructed  mind 
can  suppose  that  there  is  anything  like  our  ideas  existing  in 
the  bodies  themselves.  These  are  the  so-called  secondary  quali- 
ties which  according  to  Locke  are  "nothing  in  the  objects  them- 
selves but  powers  to  produce  various  sensations  in  us  by  certain 
modifications  of  their  primary  qualities." 

His  real  contribution  to  the  philosopliic  thought  ot  the  time 
is  to  be  seen  in  his  endeavor  to  apph'  the  critical  method  of 
Bacon  to  the  study  of  the  mind.  He  thus  succeeded  in  reducing 
the  mind  to  a  series  of  unrelated  atoms  of  sense  experiences 
which  neither  aflord  nor  justify  a  reference  beyond  themselves. 


MODERX  PHlLOSOPIir  FROM  DF.SC.IRTKS  TO  K.I  XT.  II3 

"All  general  knowledge,"  Locke  repeatedly  s:;^'s,  "lies  only  in 
our  thoughts  and  consists  barel}'  in  the  contemplation  of  our 
own  abstract  ideas. "^  Still  Locke  appreciated  the  fact  that 
knowledge  being  thus  limited  Wf  want  something  else.-  This 
'something  else'  he  attempts  to  obtain  by  the  employment  of 
the  judgment  which  he  defines  as  "the  presuming  things  to  be 
so  without  perceiving  it."  Locke  as  an  epistemologist  at  once 
goes  beyond  the  conclusion  of  his  psychology,  and  it  is  to  be 
said  that  Locke  really  stopped  where  the  problem  of  knowledge 
properly  begins;  and  despite  the  evident  psychological  character 
of  his  work  he  inconsistently  maintained  the  spirituality  of  the 
soul  and  the  existence  of  purely  spiritual  substances. 

The  general  advance  made  by  Berkeley  over  Locke  is  to  be 
inferred  from  his  attempt  to  prove  that  not  the  secondary  quanti- 
ties onh-,  hur  the  primary  ones  as  well,  are  the  products  of  the 
human  mind.  The  w-orld  about  us  is  much  more  dependent 
upon  the  mind  than  we  have  hitherto  thought.  Matter  is  a 
mere  abstraction,  one  of  those  words  which  serve  only  to  throw 
a  'veil  and  mist'  between  the  mind  and  truth.  There  is  no 
material  substratum  of  things  and  to  be  is  to  be  perceived.  But 
as  Reid  says,  "The  pillars  by  which  the  existence  of  a  material 
world  was  supported  were  so  feeble  that  it  did  not  require  the 
force  of  a  Samson  to  bring  them  down."  For  Berkeley  matter 
is  reduced  to  simple  ideas  with  the  notion  of  some  cause.' 
Thus  at  one  fell  blow  Berkeley  identifies  the  objects  of  knowl- 
edge with  the  ideas  of  the  mind.  "The  very  existence  of  ideas 
constitute  the  soul.  Mind  is  a  congeries  of  perceptions.  Take 
away  perception  and  you  take  away  the  mind.  Put  the  per- 
ceptions and  \()u  put  the  mind."' 

Here,  apparently,  a  complete  break  is  made  with  the  external 
world  and  the  mind's  ability  to  construct  its  own  world  vindi- 
cated. But  Berkeley  did  not  make  good  his  contention.  His 
denial  of  the  existence  of  matter  was  made  primarily  for  the 
sake  of  refutins:  atheism  ami  materialism.      Bur  with  the  denial 

'  Essay,  15k.  I  and  IV',  ch.  iii,  14. 

'  Ibid.',    Hk.   IV,  cli.  iv,  3. 

'  Treatise,  sections  I,  2,  3,  4,  6. 

*  Life  and  Letters,  p.  438;  also,  Treatise,  sections  68,  75,  80,  19,  20. 


1  1 4  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

of  the  material  world,  the  (juestion  at  once  arose  as  to  the  onijin 
of  our  ideas,  to  solve  which  Berkeley  substituted  the  laws  of  the 
Internal  Spirit  for  the  laws  of  nature.'  Like  Plato,  with  whom 
he  was  familiar,  Berkeley  came  to  estimate  low  the  knowledge 
derived  throuuh  the  senses  and  in  the  Sins  concerns  himself 
with  the  problem  of  showing  how  we  may  arrive  at  a  higher 
knowledge  of  the  Eternal  Spriti  than  that  afforded  by  the 
phenomena  of  sense.*  It  is  true,  he  insists,  that  God  speaks  in 
nature  to  us,  but  it  is  only  through  rational  faith  in  causality, 
that  we  come  to  discern  the  chain  running  throughout  the  whole 
system  of  things  and  only  by  a  process  of  ascending  from  the 
lower  to  the  higher  can  we  reach  a  knowledge  of  the  Highest 
Being. ^ 

The  consequences  of  the  metaphysics  of  Berkeley  are  pointed 
out  by  Hume  who  is  the  legitimate  outcome  of  British  Empiri- 
cism from  Bacon  and  Hobbes  to  Berkeley.  With  Hume,  on 
the  contrary,  the  mind's  break  with  matter  is  made  complete. 
His  attempt  to  solve  the  Cartesian  problem  is  in  reality  the 
denial  of  the  problem,  by  denying  substantial  existence  to  both 
mind  and  matter.  According  to  Hume,  the  mind  is  its  contents. 
These  contents  are  of  two  sorts,  impressions  and  ideas  which 
are  only  fainter  impressions.  These  alone  constitute  the 
objects  of  thought.  The  substantiality  of  the  self  is  a  delusion 
and  what  we  call  the  mind  is  but  a  heap  of  perceptions  united 
by  certain  relations.  Causality  itself  is  only  the  succession  of 
phenomena — relation  between  our  ideas — v.nd  arises  onh'  from 
experience. 

The  outcome  of  the  philosophy  ot  Hume  was  the  reducing 
of  mind  as  well  as  matter  to  mere  phenomena  and  the  denial  of 
any  causal  nexus  between  cause  and  effect.  There  is  tlierefore 
no  permanent  element  in  the  world  of  experience  and  no  valid 
element  whereby  thought  may  justify  the  objective  validity  of 
knowledge.  Hume  holds,  that  to  form  the  idea  of  an  object 
and  to  form  an  idea  simply,  are  one  and  the  same  thing,  the 
reference  of  an  idea  to  an  object  being  an  extraneous  denomina- 

*  Op.  cil.,  Stctions  26,  65,  31,  32. 

'  Op.  cit.,  90,  91. 

*0p.  cit.,  148;  Akiphron,  Dialogue  I\'. 


MODERN  PHlLOSOPHr  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  KANT.  I15 

tion  o[  winch  the  idea  itself  bears  no  mark  or  character.'  It 
was  this  complete  subversion  of  the  necessary  and  universal 
character  of  knowledge  which  awakened  Kant  from  his  dog- 
matic slumber  and  gave  birth  to  the  common-sense  philosophy 
of  the  Scottish  School. 


Leibn 


iz. 


Before  proceeding  to  the  philosophy  of  Kant,  it  is  necessary 
to  take  note  of  the  attempt  of  Leibniz  to  remove  the  antithesis 
between  mind  and  matter,  without  surrendering  the  aesthetic  and 
religious  conceptions  which  were  dangerously  threatened  bv  the 
Empiricists.  Leibniz,  like  Spinoza,  appreciates  the  unphilo- 
sophic  character  of  the  Dcus  ex  machina  of  Descartes,  but  like- 
wise appreciates  that  the  Dens  sive  natiira  of  Spinoza  solves  the 
problem  by  a  sort  of  back-door  method. 

The  epistemology  of  Leibniz  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  via 
media  between  two  extremes,  of  Empiricism  which  reduced 
knowledge  to  a  series  of  sensations  externally  produced  and 
thus  lacking  both  universality  and  necessity,  and  of  Rationalism 
that  made  knowledge  consist  only  of  clear  and  distinct  ideas. 
Like  Spinoza  he  considers  that  the  notion  of  substance  is  the 
necessary  starting-point  of  metaphysical  inquiry,  but  while  the 
former  defined  substance  in  terms  of  independent  existence,  the 
latter  defines  it  in  terms  of  process.  "La  substance  ne  saurait 
etre  sans  action."  Thus  while  Spinoza  attempted  to  reconcile 
the  dualism  of  mind  and  matter  in  terms  of  identity  of  content, 
Leibniz  made  a  similar  attempt  in  terms  oi process?  According 
to  Leibniz  perception  and  apperception,  sense-perception  and 
thought  can  not  be  completely  sundered.  They  differ  not  in 
kind  but  in  their  degree  of  development,  so  that  body  is  to  be 
defined  as  confused  soul  while  soul  is  body  become  clear  and 
distinct.  Either  mind  or  body  represents  a  meaningless  abstrac- 
tion apart  from  the  other  and  neither  exists  apart  from  the 
other.  Reality  is  therefore  partly  material  and  partly  immate- 
rial,     rhe  law  of  continuity  demands  that  the  soul  always  thinks 


'  Treatise-,  I,  I't.  Ill,  8,   14. 
'  Leibniz,  Monad. ^  66,  67,  6q. 


Il6  THE  .{ESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

and  that  while  sense  knowledge  precedes  rational  knowledge 
thev  difttr  in  degree  only.  \\  hence  then  the  origin  of  our  ideas  ? 
In  the  Not4veaux  Essais,  Leihni/.  insists,  as  against  Locke, 
that  all  our  ideas  are  innate  but  uiiplicitl\  rather  than  ixpltcitly 
so.'  The  soul  is  windowless  facing  the  eternal  world  so  that 
all  our  knowledge  is  developed  from  the  possibilities  of  thought 
within  itself.  Ideas  as  little  as  anything  else  are  given  to  the 
mind  from  without.-  The  Monads  are  simple,  indivisible  and 
indestructible  units  and  differ  from  each  other  only  in  the  degree 
of  the  clearness  with  which  thev  represent  other  monads.  Each 
monad  however  is  a  little  world  in  itself,  a  mirror  of  the  whole 
of  reality.  Each  one  has  also  a  dual  nature,  that  is,  it  is  partly 
active  and  partly  passive,  the  passive  element  corresponding  to 
the  Aristotelian  matter,  the  active  aspect  to  the /orm  or  entelechv 
of  the  monad. 

Leibniz  saves  himself  from  a  subjective  idealism  bv  his  postu- 
late of  Pre-established  Harmony,  according  to  which  the  ideas 
come  to  possess  objective  value  since  the  development  of  the 
psychic  monad  is  paralleled  by  the  development  of  the  cosmic 
monad. ^  The  idea  of  God,  as  pure  actuality,  plays  a  determin- 
ing part  in  the  Leibnizian  scheme;  but  he  guards  against  the 
mechanical  necessity  of  Spinoza,  by  insisting  that  of  all  possible 
worlds,  God  chose  the  best,  and  even  apart  from  divine  choice 
the  best  would  in  the  end  prevail  over  all  others  and  become 
actual.  The  lex  mclioris  by  which  Leibniz  sought  to  give 
meaning  and  beauty  to  the  world-order,  is  established  upon 
the  law  of  sufficient  reason  which  is  both  a  law  of  thought  and  a 
law  of  being. 

Both  in  spirit  and  method  the  philosophy  of  Leibniz  is  strik- 
ingly comparable  to  the  Platonic  and  his  attempt  at  a  reconcilia- 
tion of  opposing  systems  of  thought  is  poetic  rather  than  scien- 
tific. According  to  the  programme  laid  out  by  the  philosopher 
the  dualism  must  necessarily  fall  within  consciousness  and  in  his 
definmg  the  epistemological  problem  as  the  passage  from  tlic 
realm  of  unconscious  ideas  to  the  realm  <if  the  clear  and  distinct 

'  Cf.  Petitcs  Pfrcfptions,  Nnv  Essays  (Latta"s  trs.). 
'  Monad,  78. 
Mbid.,  83,  86. 


MODERX  PHILOSOPHY  FROM  DESCAR.'ES  TO  KJXT.  II7 

ideas.  It  is  interestino;  to  note,  that  in  so  far  as  he  dealt  at  all  with 
the  problem  and  place  of  the  beautiful,  Leibniz  places  it  on  the 
border-land  of  the  conscious  and  rhc  unconscious,  the  active 
and  the  passive,  aspect  ot  ideas,  as  partaking  of  the  nature  of 
both  and  serving  as  the  common  ground  of  both.' 

Tlir  Faith  Philosophers. 

With  the  recognition  of  the  limitations  of  reason,  there  is  also 
to  be  seen  an  attempt  to  vindicate  the  rights  of  feeling.  Hoth 
Rationalism  and  ICmpiricism,  as  final  interpretations  of  human 
experience  having  failed,  the  search  of  the  age  is  for  some  'trans- 
cendent notion'-  which  shall  reconcile  the  unending  conflict 
between  the  mechanical  and  the  teleological,  the  material  and 
the  immaterial,  betw^een  the  naive  and  rhc  ideal  concepts  of 
causality.  We  have  indicated  the  rise  ot  the  same  problem 
under  different  conditions  and  at  different  times  and  have 
attempted  to  show  that  the  final  interpretation  reached  in  each 
instance  was  aesthetic  rather  than  scientific  and  discursive.  At 
such  periods,  as  Lessing  has  pointed  out,  thought  must  proceed 
gymnastically  rather  than  dogmatically.  The  recognition  be- 
came a  contagion  by  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  that 
the  art,  science  and  literature  of  the  past  arc  but  idealized 
expressions  of  the  inner  life  of  feeling  and  will.  Winckelmann 
(1755)  in  his  Gedanketi  iiber  die  Nachahiniing  der  griechischen 
Ktinsiu-erke,  showed  that  Greek  life  was  the  source  and  the 
prototype  of  Greek  art  and  literature.  Lessing  in  the  Laokoon 
(1766)  attempted  to  point  out  not  only  the  'that'  but  the  'hoiv  of 
Greek  art,  and  contributed  to  the  casting  aside  of  the  false  inter- 
pretations and  arbitrary  rules  in  which  a  pseudo-classicism  had 
wholh'  submerjied  the  works  of  the  classic  artists  and  authors. 
For  Lessing,  Greek  art  is  essentially  the  expression  and  embodi- 
ment of  the  inner  vision,  and  instead  of  its  being  a  slavish  imita- 
tion of  nature  according  to  certain  prescribed  rules,  it  is  a  free 
creation,  in  which  the  individual  lifts  himself  above  nature. 
The  forms  of  the  Greek  artists  were  not  born  of  external  con- 

'  Lotze.  Gt-Sihtihtf  J.  Aesthclik,  p.   275. 

'  Hotfding,  Problems  of  Philosophy,  p.    100. 


1 1 S  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

straiiir,  hut  were  rather  conceived  in  the  sjDhere  ot  pure  beauty 
which  thus  awakening  no  desire,  at  once  transported  the  mind 
into  a  dream  of  undisturbed  immediacy.  Therefore  Winckel- 
mann  concludes,  that  if  we  would  pn)duce  works  of  art  like  the 
(jreeks,  we  must  learn  to  feel  and  live  as  the  Greeks  lived  and 
felt,  that  is,  we  must  be  as  true,  as  noble,  as  free  in  our  nature 
as  they  were. 

According  to  the  Faith  Philosophers,  who  carried  forward 
the  attempted  vindication  of  feeling,  the  source  of  truth  is  to  be 
sought  in  intuition  rather  than  in  discursive  thought.'  The 
highest  truths  are  to  be  felt  not  demonstrated.  The  most  detailed 
statement  of  the  Faith  philosoph\^  is  to  be  fountl  in  jacobi  and 
we  limit  ourselves  to  a  resume  of  his  thought.  He  held  that 
the  understanding  alone  can  not  guarantee  reality,  and  in  har- 
mony with  the  conclusions  of  Lessing  and  Winckelmann, 
insists  that  reality  can  only  be  presumed  and  felt.-  Pure  reason, 
as  the  doctrine  of  concepts,  can  lead  only  to  atheism  and  fatal- 
ism. The  conditioned  can  be  made  intellifiible  only  by  means 
of  the  unconditioned  wliich  lies  beyond  the  reach  of  reason.  It 
is  only  by  the  intuitive  knowledge  of  feeling  that  we  are  able  to 
transcend  our  finite  and  limited  selves,  and  reach  in  beauty  that 
perfect  union  of  the  parts  of  being  in  virtue  of  which  it  becomes 
a  symbol  of  the  inner  life. 

It  is  also  to  be  noted  that  with  Herder  the  individualism  of 
the  Illumination  yields  to  the  conception  of  humanity  as  one  great 
individual  which  has  passed  through  a  series  of  stages  in  its 
development,  strikingly  similar  to  the  stages  ir.  the  development 
of  the  individual  himself  from  infancy  to  old  age.  These  con- 
ceptions  of  the  faith  philosophy  were  carried  out  in  the  mystical 
extravagances  of  the  Romanticists  after  Kant,  so  that  we  turn 
now  to  a  study  of  the  philosophy  of  the  Sage  of  Konigsberg  in 
whom  the  several  streams  of  pre-Kantian  thought  met  and  from 
whom  issued  the  characteristic  tendencies  of  the  philosopiu'  ot 
the  modern  period. 


'  Vide,  KalckcnbcTg,  Htst.  of  Mod.    Phil.,  pp.  310;  .Also  Hoft'tling,  Hist,  of 
Mod.  Phil.,  p.  3-18. 

'  Falckenbcrg,  op.  nt.,  p.  J13. 


MODERN  PHlLOSOPHr  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  KANT.  119 

Katit. 

The  epistemological  problem  set  by  the  antithesis  of  mind 
and  matter,  sense  and  reason,  which  had  been  the  burden  of 
discussion  from  Descartes  to  Wolff  and  from  Bacon  and  Hobbes 
to  Berkeley  and  Hume  remained  vet  unsolved  when  Kant  came 
into  the  field.  The  two-fold  problem  as  to  the  origin  of  our  ideas 
and  the  validity  of  their  objective  reference,  which  the  Empiri- 
cists attempted  to  solve  by  holding  that  all  our  ideas  arc  the  result 
of  pure  experience,  and  the  Rationalists  by  making  the  ideas  an 
original  possession  of  the  mind,  was  clearly  appreciated  by  Kant 
who  at  once  set  himself  to  its  solution.  He  appears  to  have 
fully  appreciated  the  fact,  that  both  parties  in  the  discussion 
were  partly  right  and  partly  wrong,  since  each  was  concerned 
with  an  mdispensable  factor  of  all  thought;  but  each  was  wrong 
in  that  thought  to  be  vital  and  fruitful  must  be  equally  concerned 
with  both  factors.  Perceptions  without  conceptions,  he  insists 
are  meaningless,  while  conceptions  without  perceptions  are 
fruitless.  The  Rationalists  pursued  a  wholly  analytical  proced- 
ure and  sought  to  explain  all  things  by  subsuming  them  as 
predicates  under  definitely  given  subjects.  But  Kant's  acquaint- 
ance with  the  results  in  the  field  of  science  revealed  the  fallacy 
of  evolving  a  system  of  reality  from  a  number  of  given  defini- 
tions. Still  farther  the  discoveries  of  Galilei,  Newton,  Huygens 
and  others  were  presenting  a  series  of  predicates  which  could 
not  be  explained  by  an  analysis  of  any  given  subject. 

According  to  Kant,  the  object  of  knowledge,  is  neither  mak- 
ing explicit  what  was  already  implicit  in  the  mind,  nor  the 
chance  coming  together  of  impressions  from  the  external  world, 
but  the  construction  of  an  object  within  consciousness.  The 
objects  of  thought  can  be  none  other  than  the  product  of  thought. 
As  to  its  content  the  object  of  knowledge  is  particular  and  con- 
tingent, while  the  form,  which  is  of  the  mind's  own  contributing 
lends  universality  and  necessity.  The  antithesis  in  knowledge 
is  not  between  subject  and  object,  as  independent  substances, 
but  an  antithesis  between  the  activity  of  the  understanding  and 
sensuous  perception.  Thinking,  according  to  Kant  is  the  cate- 
gorizing of  sense  data  and  the  categories  are  the  relations  estab- 


120  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 

lished  by  the  iniiul  among  phcnonuiia.  Ilicse  categories  are, 
however  onlv  regulative,  and  add  nothing  to  experience.  Thev 
are  neither  subjective  dispositions,  nor  completelv  developed 
ideas,  bur  'forms'  which  the  mind  fmpl()\s  in  making  articu- 
late an  otherwise  chaotic  manifold  of  sense-experiences.  Their 
value  according  to  Kant  is  the  making  of  synthetic  judgments  a 
priori  possible,  thus  establishing,  in  oj^position  to  Hume,  the 
objective  validity  of  knowledge. 

The  criticism  has  been  made  of  the  Kantian  conception  of 
the  categories,  that  thev  were  independent  of  the  intuitions  of 
sense,  and  remained  so,  as  far  as  the  work  of  Kant  goes.  Bur 
Kant  appreciated  the  nature  of  the  distinction  and  his  doctrine 
of  the  'Schema'  represents  an  attempt  upon  the  part  of  the 
synthetic  imagination  to  mediate  between  the  a  priori  forms  and 
the  manifold  of  sense — "an  art"  as  Kant  says  "hidden  in  the 
depth  of  the  human  soul,  the  true  sense  of  which  we  shall  hardly 
ever  be  able  to  understand."' 

But  while  the  categories  are  a  prion,  that  is,  independent  of 
the  manifold  intuitions  of  sense,  they  do  not  extend  our  knowl- 
edge beyond  the  phenomenal  world  and  can  not,  therefore,  lead 
to  a  knowledge  of  the  noumenal  world  given  in  sensation.  "The 
understanding  n  priori  can  never  do  more  than  anticipate  the 
form  of  a  possible  experience,  and  as  nothing  can  be  an  object 
of  experience  except  the  phenomenon,  it  follows  that  the  under- 
standing can  never  go  bevond  the  limits  of  sensibility.  As 
phenomena  are  nothing  but  representations,  the  understanding 
refers  them  to  a  something  as  the  object  of  our  sensuous  intui- 
tion. Ihis  means  a  something  equal  to  x,  of  which  we  do  not, 
nay,  with  the  present  constitution  of  our  understanding  can  not, 
know  anything."-  The  outcome  of  the  First  Critique  is  that 
there  is  no  transcendent  knowledge,  that  is,  no  possible  knowl- 
edge beyond  the  limits  of  experience.  Reason  proposes  ques- 
tions which  it  is  wliolK'  un.d^Ie  ro  answxr. 

Bur  rhe  limit  of  that  whicli  can  be  experienced  is  not  neces- 
sarily the  limit  of  rliar  which  is  or  of  thar  wjiich  ought  to  be,  or 


*  Critique  of  Pure  Reason ,  ]i.   I  1 6. 
'  Critique  of  Pure  Experience,  Intr. 


MODERN  PHlLOSOPHr  FROM  DESC.1RTES  TO  K.1XT.  121 

in  other  terms,  the  practical  reason  is  not  necessarih'  hinitecl 
because  we  have  found  that  the  theoretical  reason  is  thus  liniircd. 
We  are  active  and  volitional  creatures  and  while  we  find  our- 
selves unable  to  know  things-m-thcmselves,  we  can  neverthe- 
less postulate  them.  The  unconditioned,  therefore,  which  makes 
the  conditioned  significant  and  intelligible,  must  be  sought  in 
the  Practical  Reason.  Between  things  as  thcv  are  known  to  us 
and  as  they  are  in  themselves,  there  is,  for  Kant,  an  abyss  which 
the  understanding  can  not  cross.  Thought,  therefore,  as  Caird 
says,  may  like  a  physician,  cure  the  ills  of  others  but  can  not 
meet  the  challenge  to  heal  its  own. 

But  if  the  Critique  of  the  Pure  Reason  was  sceptical  toward 
the  ideas  which  made  reason  possible,  the  Critique  of  the  Practi- 
cal Reason  sought  at  once  to  establish  the  validity  of  these  ideas 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  moral  life.  Thus  once  again,  though 
with  a  material  and  a  technique  wholly  impossible  at  an  earlier 
period,  the  moral  consciousness  functions  as  an  epistemological 
postulate.  According  to  Kant  the  moral  consciousness  alone 
can  carry  thought  beyond  the  phenomenal  to  the  universally 
valid  ground  on  which  all  higher  truth  rests.  The  active, 
volitional  life  outruns  the  theoretical,  and  Kant,  with  a  long  line 
of  idealists,  finds  a  solution  of  the  epistemological  problem  in 
terms  of  the  working  will.  Upon  an  analysis  of  the  moral  con- 
sciousness, he  finds  that  its  characteristics  are  precisely  those 
demanded  by  his  analysis  of  the  epistemological  consciousness. 

Mediating  between  the  pure  reason,  which  is  the  faculty  of 
the  a  priori  forms  of  knowledge,  and  the  practical  reason,  as  the 
faculty  of  the  a  prion  principles  of  conduct,  is  the  judgment, 
which  is  the  faculty  of  the  a  priori  forms  and  principles  of  the 
aesthetic  feeling.  For  Kant,  therefore,  the  beautiful,  which  is 
the  object  of  the  judgment,  mediates  between  the  true  and  the 
good  which  are  the  objects  of  the  theoretical  ami  the  practical 
reason  respectively.'  The  judgment  as  the  faculty  by  which 
the  manifoKl  of  sense  is  unified,  and  the  phenomenal  world 
brought  under  the  principle  of  design,  thus  awakening  in  con- 
sciousness the  sentiment  of  the  beautiful,  becomes  the  principle 

'  Cf.  Bosanquet,  Hist,  of  Aesthetics,  p.  256. 


122  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

of  world  inrerpretation  and  unihcation.'  But  the  judgments 
are  two-fold  in  character:  First,  the  teleological  judgment 
that  has  to  do  with  the  problem  of  adaptation  and  arises  only 
when  the  mechanical  explanation  fails.  The  teleological  con- 
cept is,  however,  onlv  regulative  of  experience,  as  appears  trom 
the  antinomy  which  Kant  treats  in  the  dialectic  of  the  teleologi- 
cal judgment.  Thus  it  is  to  be  inferred  that  Kant  appreciated 
the  limitation  of  the  mechanical  view  of  the  organic  world  which 
prevailed  during  the  seventeenth  and  the  opening  years  of  the 
eighteenth  centuries.  Mechanism  and  teleology  are,  as  doc- 
trines, irreconcilable  and  impossible,  but  as  points  of  view, 
attitudes  toward  a  presented  content,  they  are  both  necessary 
and  compatible.  Thus  Kant  appears  to  have  felt,  what  is  more 
strongly  feir  in  our  day,  that  description  and  appreciation  can 
not  develop  independently  of  each  other,  and  that  the  theoretical 
and  normative  sciences  are  not  developed  in  entire  isolation. 

In  pointing  out  the  several  movements  of  thought  before 
Kant,  the  Faith  Philosophers  were  cited  as  bringing  forward 
and  emphasizing  the  feeling  aspect  of  consciousness  which  had 
hitherto  been  completely  ignored,  or  at  least,  made  subordinate 
to  the  other  aspects  of  consciousness.  The  Empiricists  had 
insisted,  however,  that  it  is  onlv  in  feeling  that  genuine  contact 
with  reality  is  had  and  a  personal  guarantee  of  truth  secured. 
The  attempt  was  made,  therefore,  to  reduce  all  things,  includ- 
ing beauty,  to  mere  feeling.  The  Rationalists,  on  the  contrary, 
characteristically  insisted  that  personality,  individuality,  truth 
and  reality  are  meaningless  when  reduced  to  brute  feeling;  and  all 
things  were  then  reduced  to  thought,  and  beauty  was  freed  from 
the  element  of  feeling.  Kant's  doctrine  of  the  aesthetic  judg- 
ment, as  mediating  between  these  antithetical  views  of  the 
beautiful  at  once  suggested  itself  as  the  necessary  and  appro- 
priate mediating  principle  between  these  two  opposed  types  of 
theory. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  in  the  present  connection,  that  in  his 
analysis  of  the  aesthetic   consciousness,    Kant    finds   precisely 

'  Kritik  d.  Urthcilskraft,  Jf'crkf  4,  14;  Falckcnbcrg,  op.  cit.,  p.  40,  ff;  Hciffding, 
of>.  ctt.,  p.   104,  ft'.;  Hcgcl,  History  of  Philosophy,  111,  p.  543. 


MODERX  PHILOSOPHT  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  KANT.  123 

those  characteristics  which  the  epistenioloj^ical  consciousness 
demands  for  the  sokuiun  of  its  own  characteristic  problem.  He 
appears  to  have  appreciated  tliat  his  discussion  in  the  second 
Critique  only  pushed  the  problem  farther  back  and  that  the 
problem  can  be  solved  only  in  terms  of  feeling,  which  mediates 
between  reason  and  desire.  Neither  thought  nor  conduct  can 
give  us  a  complete  object,  since  each  refers  beyond  itself.  Feel- 
ing, on  the  other  hand,  presupposes  a  complete  idea  of  the 
object.  The  problem  to  which  Kant  gives  himself  after  con- 
cluding that  the  feelings  possess  an  epistemological  significance, 
is  the  determintaion  of  the  a  priori  forms  of  feeling  without 
which  the\'  would  possess  neither  universal  nor  necessary  valid- 
ity. Are  there  aesthetic  judgments  and  what  are  their  dL-fferen- 
tia  .''  The  object  alike  of  thought  and  desire  is  necessarily  sub- 
ordinated to  some  end.  The  new  problem  to  which  Kant  now 
sets  himself  is  the  determination  of  those  feelings  which  are 
motived  by  no  conscious  purpose.  Such  feelings,  Kant  finds, 
make  up  the  content  of  the  beautiful  and  the  sublime.  The 
beautiful  is  thus  distinguished  from  both  the  true  and  the  good 
in  that  it  is  the  object  of  a  completely  disinterested  satisfaction.' 
It  differs  from  the  merely  agreeable  in  that  it  is  the  object  of 
universal  satisfaction.  It  differs  further  from  the  good  in  that 
it  pleases  without  a  concept.  The  pleasure  of  the  perfect  is  con- 
ceptual, of  the  good  is  purposeful,  while  the  pleasure  of  the 
beautiful  is  emotional  and  hence  immediate.  The  secret  of 
aesthetic  construction  is,  that  in  it,  the  mind  constructs  its 
own  objects  without  purpose  and  under  its  own  immediate 
control. 

The  object  therefore  that  shall  at  once  reconcile  the  sensuous 
and  the  formal,  the  mechanical  and  the  teleological,  is  one  that 
recognizes  the  legitimacy  and  the  place  of  the  several  demands  of 
consciousness  and  in  the  construction  of  which  both  sense-percep- 
tion and  reason  cooperate.  As  to  the  objectivity  of  the  object 
presented  by  the  aesthetic  consciousness,  Kant  was  somewhat 
in  doubt,  and  in  the  end  asserted  the  existence  of  a  principle  of 
beauty  and  purpose  and  goodness  hidden  in  nature  which  reason 

'  Purposive  without  the  idea  of  an  eiui,'  Krittk  J.  Urfetlskraft,p.Sj,  note. 


i:.4  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERJEXCE. 

can  not  formulare.  Nevertheless  Kant  recognized  the  epistem- 
ological  vakie  of  the  aestlietic  consciousness  and  his  analysis  of 
the  latter  is  a  faitiiful  reflection  of  the  epistemological  problem 
of  the  iinivcrsrili/.ation  and  ohjcctification  of  experience. 

Tlir  German  M vstics. 

The  outcome  of  the  Kantian  discussions  is  that  the  object  of 
thouirht  is  thoujzht's  own  construction.  The  world  that  each  of 
us  knows  is  made  by  him  rather  than  for  him,  through  the  activ- 
ity of  consciousness  itself.  The  problem  is  no  longer  as  to  how 
the  world  as  already  organized  is  carried  over  into  the  mind  as 
Locke  thought,  but  rather  how  we  can  construct  our  own  world. 
The  object  of  thought  is  neither  an  immediate  datum  of  sense, 
a  brute  shock  as  the  Empiricists  held,  nor  a  mere  predicate 
analyzed  out  of  an  already  given  subject,  but  essentially  a  free 
construction  upon  the  part  of  consciousness.  In  this  way  Kant 
thought  to  be  able  to  strike  a  balance  between  the  empirical  and 
speculative  tendencies  of  his  age.  His  philosophy  must  be 
regarded  as  an  idealism  whose  peculiarity  is  to  be  sought  in  its 
attempt  to  mediate  between  and  reconcile  the  apparently  irre- 
concilable antagonisms  of  the  philosophy  and  science  of  the 
preceding  age.  The  three  Critiques^  however,  lack  a  principle 
of  unity  which  shall  at  once  bind  them  together  and  thus  reduce 
the  entire  discussion  to  unity.  The  general  advance  made  by 
Kant  is  to  be  seen  in  the  fact,  that  both  the  theoretical  and  the 
practical  reason  are  given  independent  treatment,  with  neither 
of  which  is  it  possible  to  identify  the  self  as  the  'transcendental 
unity  of  apperception.'  Until  Kant,  no  hesitancy  was  experi- 
enced in  identifying  the  self  with  the  one  or  the  other  of  its  two 
possible  aspects.  From  Socrates  on,  repeated  attempts  have 
been  made  to  identify  the  self  with  the  moral  consciousness  and 
will  has  been  repeatedly  made  the  postulate  of  thought  and 
reality.  Bur  in  each  such  instance,  as  has  been  indicated,  the 
practical  reason  was  resorted  to  only  because  the  theoretical 
consciousness  could  not  rtiukr  the  whole  content  of  experience. 
In  the  philosopin  of  K;iiu,  the  will  ma\  he  said  to  liave  come 
to  its   majority  aiul    was    brought    under  the    control    of    the 


AtODERX  PHILOSOPHl'  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  K.i.\T.  125 

individual  liimself.  But  Kant  at  once  appreciated  that  after 
reason  and  will  had  worked  themselves  through,  there  was 
still  a  meaning  left  over,  which  he  at  once  identified  with  the 
rjoiimenal,asthin  aspect  of  being  lying  beyond  all  thought,  hut 
which  nevertheless  made  thought  possible.  Thus  again,  as 
in  earlier  periods,  the  problem  ot  the  remainder  became  the 
problem  of  succeeding  thought. 

Kant  himself  found  the  principle  of  world  unification  and 
interpretation  in  the  feelings  as  the  judgment  of  the  beautiful 
and  his  immediate  disciples  followed  in  the  wake  of  the  master 
in  their  farther  search  after  unity.  Their  immediate  problem 
was  the  resolution  of  the  thing-in-itself;  without  it  one  could 
not  enter  the  Kantian  philosophy,  nor  with  it  remain  in. 
Kant  himself  seems  to  have  appreciated  the  inconsistency  of  the 
noumenal  conception,  and  suggestions  arc  found,  in  which  he 
identifies  the  'thing-in-itself  with  the  Pure  Kgo  as  the  inner 
orgamzmg  and  constructive  principle  of  the  mind.  Reinhold 
raises  the  point  at  the  outset,  as  to  the  failure  of  the  Kantian 
philosophy  owing  to  the  absence  of  some  one  presupposition 
without  which  philosophy  can  never  be  a  true  science.  Philoso- 
phy is  not  possible  until  the  philosopher  determines  upon  some 
one  principle  upon  which  the  whole  rests  and  which  adds  mean- 
ing and  beauty  to  the  whole.  But  it  is  here,  as  Reinhold 
remarks,  that  Kant  fails,  and  at  once  attempts  to  surmount  the 
failure  by  setting  up,  what  he  calls,  the  'principle  of  couscious- 
ness.'  Consciousness  thus  becomes  the  primary  fact  which 
makes  all  thought  and  conduct  possible.  Knowledge  is  made 
up  of  ideas  which  are  related  both  to  the  subject  and  the  object, 
so  that  they  must  be  distinguished  from  consciousness  as  well 
as  related  to  it.  In  fact,  consciousness  is  only  the  relating  of 
the  ideas  to  the  subject  and  object,  hence  it  is  to  be  said  of  Rein- 
hold that  he  placed  greater  emphasis  than  Kant  upon  the 
activity  and  unity  of  consciousness.  The  unity  of  conscious- 
ness can  not  therefore  be  identified  either  with  subject  or  object. 
The  various  form,  of  knowledge  are  only  the  ways  in  which  this 
relating  process  proceeds. 

It  is  thus  seen,  as  Hoffding  has  pointed  out,  that  the  Kant- 
ian conception  of  a  'thing-in-itself  has  become  restricted  to  a 


126  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

much  narrower  sphere  than  with  Kant,  from  which  it  follows 
that  neither  the  ohject  nor  the  suhject  can  he  known  in  itself, 
but  only  the  world  of  consciousness  which  hovers  between 
the  two.  The  presentation  is  distinp;uished  in  consciousness 
both  from  the  presented  object  and  the  presenting  subject, 
while  related  to  both.  The  outer  and  inner  conditions  of  reality, 
Reinhold  insists,  must  not  be  confounded.  Xoumena  are 
neither  conceived  objects  nor  rhings-in-themselves,  but  the  laws 
which  control  our  dealing  with  the  objects  of  experience.  Fail- 
ing however  to  completely  isolate  the  subject  as  the  control 
factor  of  thought  from  the  object,  while  insisting  upon  the 
necessity  of  the  unity  and  activity  of  consciousness,  Reinhold 
sought  to  transcend  the  dualism  implicit  in  all  his  work  by  set- 
ting up  an  immediacy  of  consciousness  in  which  both  aspects 
are  merged  in  an  ultimate  unity. 

Maimon  also  holds  with  Reinhold  that  the  two  aspects  of  all 
knowledge  as  held  by  Kant  must  be  given  up  and  that  knowl- 
edge must  be  deduced  from  one  common  principle.  The  dis- 
tinction between  matter  and  form  can  be  relative  only.  He 
departs  from  Reinhold,  however,  in  maintaining  that  ir  is 
impossible  to  establish  a  single  highest  principle.  1  he  principle 
of  consciousness  as  held  by  Reinhold  expresses  what  is  common 
to  all  principles,  while  the  special  principles  are  not  deducible 
from  it.  Assuming  the  dualistic  character  of  all  knowledge, 
Maimon  holds,  that  running  throughout  all  knowledge,  there 
is  an  endeavor  to  reduce  the  dualism  to  unity.  In  fact  it  is  pre- 
cisely this  demand  for  continuity  that  makes  knowledge  possible. 
Experience  is  not,  therefore,  a  necessary  relation,  but  the  actual 
continuity  of  the  perceived  phenomena.  1  hings,  objects  exist 
only  in  and  for  consciousness.  We  understand  only  what  we 
ourselves  construct.  The  thing-in-itself,  whether  the  subject 
within  or  the  object  without,  represents  a  limiting  notion  only, 
which  can  in  no  way  become  an  object  of  knowledge.  The 
problem  of  knowledge  is  the  apprehension  of  phenomena 
through  their  reciprocal  relations.'  Fhe  instinctive  desire  of  all 
thought  is  the  desire  for  unity,  totality,  which  Hnds  its  locus  and 

'  Jacob!  and  Fichtc,  1799. 


MODERX  PHILOSOPHY  FROM  DESCARTES  TO  KANT.  127 

explanation  ni  tlie  instinctive  desire  for  perfection.  Hut  the 
idea  of  totality  and  unitv  can  not  be  had  as  an  object  of  thought, 
while  the  striving  for  unity  has  only  ethical  value.  How  then 
is  unity  of  apprehension  to  be  realized  .''  How  can  the  individ- 
ual reach  beyond  the  limitations  of  his  present  experience  and 
comprehend  the  chaotic  manifold  in  a  single,  self-contained 
experience.''  Such  unity  can  not  be  had  in  terms  of  thought, 
jNlaimon  continues,  since  thought  always  points  beyond  itself. 
In  his  further  criticism  of  Kant,  Maimon  suggested  a  theory  of 
knowledge  which  would  have  led  beyond  the  limitations  of 
Kant,  but  he  became  involved  in  the  romantic  cravings  of  the 
age,  and  in  search  after  unit\'  in  terms  of  imagination  as  a 
sort  ot  immediate  deliverance  of  pure  feeling.  So  it  can  be 
concluded  with  Hoffding  that  "The  romantic  craving  for 
unity,  the  longing  to  revel  in  the  absolute,  to  unite  thought 
with  artistic  conceptions,  was  too  strong  to  permit  of  Maimon's 
critical  and  skeptical  considerations  exciting  any  permanent 
interest." 

Throughout  his  whole  life  Schiller  manifested  a  genuine 
delight  in  philosophical  matters,  a  fact  which  justifies  the  bring- 
ing forward  of  his  name  in  the  present  connection.  He  was 
an  artist,  rather  than  a  philosopher,  but  took  to  philosophy,  as 
he  himself  said,  in  order  to  prove  that  the  artist  alone  is  the  true 
man  and  that  art  as  such  is  the  peculiar  characteristic  of  man: 

"Die  Kunst,  O  Menscii,  hast  du  allein." 

Influenced  at  first  by  the  ideal  of  freedom  according  to  nature, 
an  ideal  borrowed  from  Rousseau  and  the  English  l.mpiricists, 
he  finally  arrived  at  the  conception  of  the  perfection  of  the  indi- 
vidual through  the  harmonious  development  of  his  own  powers, 
a  development  however  proceeding  from  wuhm.  In  the  light 
of  such  ideal,  no  power  of  the  individual  is  to  be  regarded  as 
unfit  and  unclean.  Nature  hath  joined  the  sensuous  and  the 
rational  and  let  no  man  'put  them  asunder.''  His  problem  was 
thus  the  problem  of  the  age  as  to  how  the  sensuous  and  the  rational 

'  Vide,  y ersuch    iibcr   den    Zusammenhang   der  tienschcn   N atur    des    Mcn- 
schen  mit  seiner  geisttgen. 


128  THE  AESTHETIC  LXi'ERIES'CE. 

ct)ulcl  be  bicnifzht  toiicther  in  some  harmonious  \va\'.  1  he  ideal 
life  can  not  be  reached  bv  leaving  the  sensuous  behind,  nor  can 
the  highest  development  of  the  one  be  secured  by  the  supression 
of  the  other.  1  hr  old-time  uniiv  between  mind  and  nature, 
the  one  and  the  many,  has  been  lost  as  a  result  of  advancing 
culture.  i  he  bringing  together  of  these  two  aspects  of  human 
experience  represents  the  problem  of  the  age  as  Schiller  saw  ir 
and  he  sought  solution  in  the  aesthetic  experience.  To  plav  is 
human  and  plav  is  the  beginning  of  art.  Onlv  as  the  indivitlual 
plays  is  he  reallv  human  in  the  sense  of  reaching  a  free  determina- 
tion of  himself.  All  other  activities  of  the  individual  arise  from 
some  particular  attitude  and  thus  set  a  limit  upon  the  mind, 
whereas  the  aesthetic  experience  is  self-contained  and  leads  to 
the  unlimited.  The  aesthetic  experience  is  a  whole  in  itself  and 
completes  in  itself  all  other  experiences,  so  that  in  it,  the  individ- 
ual feels  as  if  he  were  snatched  out  of  time,  be>ond  the  'flainma- 
tia  moenia'  of  the  world,  to  an  experience  in  which  all  his  powers 
function  harmoniously  without  being  moved  or  conditioned  by 
external  powers  or  needs.  Only  by  a  free  play  of  the  indi\  id- 
ual's  own  powers  can  he  express  himself  as  a  totality,  that 
'schone  seele'  in  which  the  conflict  between  the  sensuous  and  the 
super-sensuous  is  transcended.'  Artistic  activity  thus  mediates 
between  the  lower  sensuous  impulses  and  the  higher,  rational 
form-impulses  and  unites  the  two  sides  of  human  nature  into 
a  harmonious  whole.  "In  all  the  years;"  he  says,  "art  has  been 
the  one  mirror  which  held  up  to  men  a  picture  of  their  real  self. 
To  it  we  must  again  return  if  we  would  find  deliverance  from 
the  limitations  into  which  thought  and  conduct  alike  involve  us. 
Science,  jihilosopin',  political  and  business  activities  appeal  to 
individual  aspects  of  human  nature  only.  It  is  art  alone  that 
demands  the  whole  man  and  which  can  thus  restore  the  inner 
harmony  of  primitive  nature.  Man  is  onlv  fullv  man  m  per- 
ceiving and  creating  the  beautiful,  which  can  arise  only  from  tlie 
most  complete  and  harmonious  blinding  of  the  iial  ami  riie 
ideal,  of  matter  aiul  form,  of  necessity  and  freedom." 

The  search  after  unitv  and  totality  of  experience  became  a 

'  Briejen  tiher  die  astbetische  Erxiehung,  and  Anmut  u.  ffiirde. 


MODKRX   THOVailT.  I29 

passion  with  the  men  of  the  closino;  years  of  the  eighteenth  and 
the  opening  years  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Both  in  pohtical 
matters  and  in  thought  the  unity  of  the  spirit  was  everywhere 
seeking  a  more  complete  embodiment.  As  in  the  past,  so  again, 
men  looked  both  to  religion  ami  to  art  as  the  means  of  a  more 
adequate  expression  of  the  increased  richness  of  liti.  The 
Critical  Philosopln'  had  left  too  far  apart  the  several  aspects  of 
thought,  and  their  unification  in  a  higher  experience  became 
the  problem  of  the  age.  The  period  was  one  of  general  upheaval. 
The  past  was  felt  to  be  altogether  inadequate  and  attempts  were 
made  everywhere  to  construct  life  and  thought  upon  a  new  basis. 
The  poetry  of  Goethe  and  Schiller  represent  attempts  to  embody 
the  profound  aspirations  of  the  times.  The  unity  and  totality 
which  thought  found  itself  unable  to  attain  unto  were  thus 
attained  in  art,  and  as  a  consequence  there  was  a  general  turning 
to  art  as  a  resource  from  the  limitations  and  embarrassments  in 
which  thought  found  itself.  Novalis  in  an  unfinished  work 
entitled  Heiurich  von  Oftcrdingeuy  held  poetry  to  be  the  inner- 
most essence  of  things  which  is,  as  such,  a  peculiar  movement  of 
the  human  spirit.  Philosophy  is,  after  all,  only  the  theory  of 
poetry  and  in  poetry  alone  is  the  mystic  word  which  completes 
and  unifies  our  otherwise  dualistic  and  discordant  experience. 
But  poetry  was  the  expression  of  feeling  rather  than  the  embodi- 
ment ot  thought,  so  that  feeling  was  everywhere  regarded  as  the 
constructive  principle  of  thought  and  life.'  The  mind  of  the 
poet  is  free  to  mould  and  construct  sensuous  images  as  it  pleases. 
The  distinction  in  thought  between  the  sensuous  and  the  super- 
sensuous  is  a  distinction  which  the  mind  itself  makes  and  in  turn 
finds  in  art  the  or<zan  of  its  reconciliation  and  transcendence. 
As  the  outcome  of  the  attempt  to  throw  the  entire  content  of  the 
intellectual  life  into  a  connected  whole  in  terms  of  feeling,  light 
was  shed  upon  many  problems  and  utterance  given  to  ideas 
which  outlived  the  several  attempts  themselves.  These  several 
movements  are  the  subject  of  more  extended  notice  in  ihr  next 
chapter. 


'  Cf.  Erdman,  op.  cit..  Vol.  II,  sections,  314,  315;  and  R.  Naym,  Die  Roman- 
tische  Schule. 


Chaptfr  IX. 

The  Development  of  Modern   Thous^ht  from  the  Post-Katttian 
Idealists    to    the   Present ^   with  Reference  to  the  Rise  of 
the    Subject-Object    Dualism    and    its    Trans- 
cendence by  Postulating  some  Form  of 
Immediacy  of  Consciousness. 

The  suggestion  of  Kant  that  the  thing-in-itself  might  be 
identical  withnthe  pure  ego,  supphed  a  lead,  not  only  for  the 
freeing  of  thought  from  the  conception  itself,  but  for  the  deter- 
mination of  the  Ego  as  the  subject  of  all  experience.  It  will  be 
recalled  that  Kant  left  a  hard  and  fast  line  of  cleavage  between 
the  pure  ego  and  the  form  and  materials  of  knowledge.  The 
ego,  as  the  'thing-in-itself,'  represents  a  remainder  as  yet 
unaccounted  tor,  and  always  the  problem  of  the  remainder 
becomes  the  problem  of  advancmg  thougin.  For  Kant  the  ego 
was  onlp  a  negative  and  hmitmg  conception,  but  one  made  nec- 
essary by  the  demand  for  conscious  unity.  Because  of  this 
limitation,  a  necessary  one,  however,  the  three  Critiques  of  Kant 
remained  more  or  less  independent  of  each  other,  and  whether 
we  agree  with  McCosh  or  not,  that  "Kantwas  distinguished  more 
as  a  logical  thinker  and  systematizer  than  a  careful  observer  of 
what  actually  takes  place  in  the  mind,"'  the  fact  is  that  he  intro- 
duced a  new  point  of  view  for  the  study  of  the  phenomena  of 
consciousness. 

Fichte. 

Kant  found  after  the  completion  of  the  first  Critique  that  his 
theory  of  knowledge  was  incomplete,  since  it  could  not  of  itself 
supjil}'  the  transcendent  element  without  which  knowledge  is 
impossible.  The  unconditioned,  which  lends  meaning  and 
relation  to  the  conditioned,  can  not  Ik  reached  in  terms  of  pure 
thought.     The  forms  are  valid  only  in  the  sphere  of  the  under- 

'  McCosh,  Realistic  Philosophy,  \'o\.  11,  p.   197. 


KP 


MODERX  THOUGHT.  I3I 

Standing.  The  three  ideas,  which  are  regulative  of  experience, 
can  not  be  arrived  at  in  terms  of  thought.  Hut  according  to 
Kant,  what  the  reason  can  not  accompHsh  tlic  moral  life  can. 
The  moral  consciousness  alone  can  carry  thought  beyond  the 
phenomenal  to  that  which  is  objectively  valid  and  universally 
necessary.  The  organization  of  experience  must  therefore  be 
sought  for  on  the  active  side  of  consciousness.  Later,  Kant 
found  a  conflict  between  these  two  disciplines  and  sought  their 
reconciliation  in  the  aesthetic  judgment  as  issuing  from  the  feel- 
ing aspect  of  consciousness.  Fichte,  however,  whose  chief  con- 
cern lay  in  the  sphere  of  the  practical,  assumed  that  out  of  this 
conflict  and  contradiction,  this  dualism  of  self  and  not-self,  the 
principle  of  knowledge  issued.  His  assumption  is  that  in  the 
moral  conflict  is  to  be  found  an  explanation  and  the  source  of 
theoretical  knowledcre.  Kant  had  already  insisted  that  the 
object  of  knowledge  is  the  outcome  of  our  own  self-activity. 
The  transcendental  ego  is  the  law-giver  of  the  universe.  But 
in  either  instance,  the  self  as  the  pure  ego  was  wholly  lacking 
in  content.  It  was  mere  form  and  its  unity  was  predetermined. 
Fichte,  on  the  other  hand,  whose  problem  was  to  bring  to  clearer 
consciousness  the  nature  of  this  free  activity  of  the  self  in  knowl- 
edge and  conduct,  holds  that  the  ego  is  both  form  and  content. 
It  is  precisely  in  this  notion  of  the  self  as  fundamentally  active 
that  Fichte  thought  to  find  the  unifying  principle  of  philosophy. 
Accordingly,  he  insists,  in  opposition  to  Kant,  that  the  self  is 
not  that  which  thinks  and  acts,  but  is  itself  the  activity.  It  is, 
he  further  insists,  an  activity  which  both  goes  (uit  of  itself  and 
returns  upon  itself.  Only  in  activity  can  the  self  be  known  and 
only  thus  can  it  realize  itself.  Kant's  "  thing-in-itselt"  thus 
becomes  the  activity  of  the  self  for  Fichte,  so  that  by  giving  it 
a  more  positive  place  in  pliilosophy  its  farther  determination 
became  possible. 

For  Fichte,  the  object  of  knowledge  is  determined,  not 
beyond  consciousness,  but  within  consciousness  as  that  which  is 
necessary  to  supplement  the  abstract  reality  of  the  ego.  The 
primary  assumption  of  knowledge  is  not  the  'I  think'  ot  Des- 
cartes, or  the  transcendental  ego  of  Kant  which  lies  behind  the 
life  of  thought  and  conduct,  nor  the  unity  of  the  subjective  and 


132  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIEXCE. 


objective  of  Reinliolcl,  Inir  rarlur  the  'I  act,'  in  which  the 
identitv  of  the  subject  and  objc-ct  is  expressed.  Ikir  rht-  noii- 
ego,  as  that  whicli  is  necessary  to  complete  the  ego,  is  derived 
from  the  ego  itself,  as  that  which  is  asserted  or  demanded  by 
the  ego  in  order  that  it  mav  have  an  object  against  which  to 
assert  its  own  consciousness.  We  come  therefore  to  beheve 
in  an  objective  world  because  we  have  previously  willed  to  do  so. 
For  Fichte  as  also  for  Schopenhauer  and  more  lately  Professor 
Royce  the  non-ego,  as  the  object  of  knowledge,  is  that  which 
the  ego  or  subject  posits  that  it  ma\'  become  completel)'  con- 
scious of  itself.  The  self  and  the  not-self,  the  subject  and  the 
object,  are  therefore  correlative,  since  neither  exists  apart  from 
the  other.  The  ego  however  must  assert  its  own  reality  before 
it  can  assert  the  reality  of  the  sense-world.  The  funda- 
mental principle  of  all  science  he  says  is  expressed  in  the  propo- 
sition, "Das  Ich  setzt  ursprunglich  schlechthin  sein  eigenes 
Seyn."'  Prior  to  all  assertions,  the  ego  must  be  asserted 
through  itself.-  The  material  of  knowledge,  to  account  for 
which  Kant  was  obliged  to  posit  a  'thing-in-irself,'  is  thus 
found  m  the  activity  of  the  self-existent  ego.  The  'thing-in- 
itseir  is  absorbed  in  the  subject,  so  that  instead  of  the  ultimate 
dualism  that  obtained  from  Descartes,  we  have  an  idealistic 
monism^  and  the  laws  of  thought  are  also  the  laws  of  being. 

The  ego,  however,  which  in  its  pure  conscious  activit\'  is 
ground  both  of  the  empirical  ego  and  the  non-ego,  remains 
for  Fichte  the  mere  unlimited.  Ir  is  onh'  through  the  ego  that 
the  non-ego  is  posited  and  the  ego  denied.  Ihtrefore,  the 
ego  both  posits  and  denies  itself.  Both  the  ego  and  the  non- 
ego  are  to  be  regarded  as  objects  of  an  ego,  which  as  yet,  lacks 
determination  in  the  Fichtcan  theory  of  knowledge.  Pichte's 
appreciation  of  this,  led  to  his  third  principle  as  an  attempted 
synthesis  of  the  former  two.  Fhe  ego,  he  says,  asserts  a  dis- 
tinguishable ego  over  against  a  distinguishable  non-ego.  Ich 
setze  nil  sicli  dcm  t/ici/hnrcn  Ich  cm  ihcilhorcs  Nicht-Ich 
entgcgen? 

'  ff  issrnschaftslchrf,  \'ol.  I,  p.   10. 

M bid.,  Vol.  I,  p.  5. 

^Complete   (forks ,  Vol.   I,  pp.  .S^ff. 


MODERX  TIIOVGHT.  1 33 

Fichte  recognizes  three  approaches  to  the  Absolute.  The 
first  has  already  been  referred  to  in  the  third  principle  of  the 
'Science  of  Kn(nvledge'  which  rt(|uired  an  ego  over  and  above 
the  mutual  limitations  of  the  divisible  ego  and  non-ego.  Since, 
he  argues,  the  individual  self  is  constantly  asserting  the  not-self, 
and  the  not-selt,  in  consequence,  is  required  to  take  successively 
higher  points  of  view,  there  must  of  necessity  be  a  'universal 
principle'  which  shall  at  once  include  all  these  activities.  But 
he  also  concludes  that  this  all-embracing  principle  must  be  of 
the  general  nature  of  the  ego  as  the  form  of  self-activity  to  which 
everything  in  the  universe  is  referred.  Fichte  also  reaches,  in 
the  same  way,  the  conception  of  an  Absolute  thought  in  which 
all  finite  processes  of  thought  are  made  complete.  Still  further, 
he  conceives  of  the  Absolute  as  the  harmony  of  freedom  and 
law,  in  wiiich  sense  God  only  is  Absolute  and  therefore  the  one 
Reality.  The  ego  is  thus  identified  with  God  from  whom,  in 
a  somewhat  Neo-Platonic  fashion,  all  reality  is  derived.  In 
God,  therefore,  as  the  Absolute  Ego,  there  is  something  more 
than  self-consciousness,  and  only  in  religion,  as  the  life  of  blessed- 
ness and  love,  can  the  individual  ego  become  one  with  the 
Absolute  Ego. 

Sc  hell  I  rig. 

\\  hat  Schelling  attempted  to  do  represented  the  next  step  in 
the  Post-Kantian  Philosophy.  The  conflict  which  Kant  rele- 
gated to  the  world  of  'things-in-themselves'  is  carried  over  by 
Fichte  into  the  consciousness  of  the  individual.  For  Kant,  the 
conflict  was  both  unavoidable  and  insoluble,  aiul  came  to  an 
end  only  in  the  Infinite.  Fichte  on  the  other  hand,  assumes 
that  out  of  these  conflicts  and  contradictions  the  principle  of 
thought  and  conduct  is  born.  The  'thing-in-itself,'  of  Kant, 
becomes  the  activity  of  the  self  fi)r  Fichte.  The  object  of  knowl- 
edge  as  the  non-ego  is  not  as  Kant  assumed,  a  substance  lying 
outside  of  consciousness  whose  qualities  the  ego  becomes  aware 
of,  but  the  assertion  of  the  ego  of  that  which  is  necessary  fiir 
its  own  realization.  1  he  world  thus  becomes  the  product  of 
our  own  consciousness,  and  the  contradiction  is  to  be  looked 
upon,  not  as  a  paralogism,  but  as  the  postulate  of  moral  con- 


134  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 

duct.  Nature  is  the  material  of  dutv,  and  without  hmit  there 
would  be  no  moral  life.'  Lvery  presentation  involves  a  con- 
flict, but  this  conflict  is  not  to  be  interpreted  as  coming  from  an 
existence  determined  whollv  apart  from  consciousness,  but 
rather  a  conflict  falling  within  consciousness,  and  is  in  itself  the 
very  making  of  thought  and  moral  conduct.  The  ego  is  thus 
both  form  and  content,  and  the  processes  of  the  world  of  nature 
become  its  own  history. 

But  in  addition  to  the  conflict  between  reason  and  desire, 
the  self  and  the  not-self,  which  Fichte  brought  together  in  an 
immediacy  of  consciousness,-  there  is  also  the  conflict  between 
the  individual  and  the  physical  world.  Ihe  philosoph\"  of 
Schelling  represents  an  attempt  to  deal  with  this  problem.  F'or 
Fichte  the  not-self  is  a  projection  of  the  self,  so  that  his  philoso- 
phy represents  an  attempt  to  identify  the  two  terms  of  the  dual- 
ism by  assuming  an  identity  of  process.  The  not-self  thus 
becomes  a  negative  concept  very  comparable  to  the  'Ding-an- 
sich'  of  Kant.  One  can  not  avoid  asking,  as  Professor  Royce 
has  asked,  why  the  ego  interrupts  its  unbroken  activity  in  order 
to  posit  the  non-ego  .''  Why  posit  the  non-ego  at  all  and  why 
posit  one  that  necessitates  a  struggle  upon  the  part  of  the  ego  :^ 
Finally  it  must  be  said  that  for  Fichte,  Nature  as  the  non-ego 
was  merely  a  limitation  of  the  ego  and  at  the  most  only  a  means 
of  the  exercise  of  the  individual's  moral  activities.  The  self 
is  not  therefore  self-controlling  and  the  not-self  of  Fichte  as 
that  in  which  the  self  seeks  sanction  and  support  for  its  con- 
structions remains,  like  the  play  object  ot  the  child,  'prag- 
matelic'  in   character.^ 

Schelling,  on  the  contrary,  holds  that  the  not-self  is  given  in 
nature.  The  self  and  the  not-self  are  therefore  to  be  identified, 
not  by  the  assumption  of  the  identity  of  process  but  of  an  identity 
of  presented  content.     All  nature  is  dual.^     Both  in  nature  and 


'  Hoffdinp,  o/>.  fit.  Vol.   11,  p.    157. 

'Vide  tspcci.Tlly  his  lectures,  Ubcr  das  ff'rsfn  Jcs  Ctlfhitcn. 
'On   the   psychology-  of    the   'Dualism   of    Inner  Struggle,'   see    Baldwin, 
Thought  an  J  Things,  Vol.  1,  p.  24."/ f. 

*  Haldwin,  Thought  and  Things,  \'ol.  1,  p.  IIQ. 

*  Cf.   System   dt-s   tr<inS(  rndrritidrn    Idrtihsfnus,   p.    I90. 


MODER.\  THOUGHT.  I35 

spirit  the  essential  principle  ot  ilLVclopinent  is  thought;  but 
while  in  Nature  thought  is  seen  struggling  toward  and  finally 
reaching  consciousness,  in  Spirit  there  is  the  progress  from  con- 
sciousness to  the  highest  reaches  of  self-conscious  thought. 
Nature,  for  Schelling,  is  'slumbering  thought'  and  exhibits  the 
three  great  modifications,  Mechanism,  Light  and  Organic  Life, 
in  each  of  which  is  present  the  fundamental  antithesis  required 
for  all  activity.'  The  Spirit  likewise,  has  passed  through  a 
series  of  similar  stages  from  theoretical  thought,  through  practi- 
cal, to  aesthetic  or  art-consciousness.  In  each  of  these  three 
stages  a  characteristic  antithesis  appears,  which  disappears  only 
with  the  appearance  of  a  more  comprehensive  mode  of  con- 
sciousness. 

The  conflict  in  the  thought  of  Schelling  is  one  that  issues 
from  a  single  principle  which  successively  appears  as  nature  and 
spirit.  In  the  second  period  of  his  activity  he  was  led  to  the 
position  that  this  common  principle,  while  somehow  distinct 
from  both  nature  and  spirit,  is,  nevertheless,  the  ground  of  both. 
The  conclusion  reached  is  that  there  is  one  principle  which  mani- 
fests itself  in  the  two  terms  of  the  dualistic  experience.  But 
Schelling  was  unable  to  carry  out  this  conclusion,  so  that  the  one 
principle,  the  substratum  of  subject  and  object,  which  he  desig- 
nates as  the  'Identical  Basis  of  all  Differences,'  is  as  much  lack- 
ing in  positive  content  and  determination  as  the  'Absolute  Self 
of  Fichte  and  the  'Ding-an-sich'  of  Kant.- 

The  epistemological  problem  presented  itself  to  Kant  as  a 
conflict  between  the  form  and  content  of  knowledge,  which  was 
overcome  in  the  aesthetic  judgment.  With  Fichte  the  conflict 
was  between  the  concrete  individual  of  the  Ego  and  the  Absolute, 
which  was  also  transcended  in  the  immediacy  of  the  religious 
consciousness.  It  is  important  to  note  that  in  both  instances 
the  principle  of  transcendence  issued  from  the  afl^ective-volitional 
aspect  of  consciousness.  It  was  a  resort  to  the  Gnniitli.  The 
active  aspect  of  consciousness  was  always  running  in  advance 
of  thoujiht;  desire  refusinjr  to  be  held  within  rlu    limitations  of 

*  Uber  Jen  ivahren  Bet^riff  der   Naturphilosophie^  Collected  Works,  \'ol.    I, 
'  Cf.  Schelling,  Phtlosophte  Jer  Mythologte. 


136  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

reason.  In  tin-  insrancc-  of  tlu-  l^omantlclsts,  and  even  of 
Fichte,  the  tinotional  aspect  of  consciousness  seized  and  deter- 
mined the  entire  Held  of  experience.  But  every  emotional 
experience  tends  toward  an  aesthetic  moment,  which  becomes, 
for  the  time,  our  final  interpretation  of  the  universe  and  our 
means  of  evaluatif)n.  But  smce  the  aesthetic  object  is  not 
merely  the  object  of  thought,  its  full  content  musi  be  sought 
elsewhere  than  in  reason.  In  the  present  instance,  as  in  the 
previous  ones,  because  of  lack  of  content  for  the  construction  of 
the  aesthetic  object,  consciousness  turns  to  the  past  and  uses 
materials  similarly  used  in  earlier  periods.  Schelling  therefore 
in  his  search  for  a  more  positive  filling  of  his  concept  of  Identity 
turned  to  the  Ideas  of  Plato,  the  Pantheism  ot  Bruno,  and  the 
Mysticism  of  Bohme.  To  his  philosophy  of  nature  and  the 
transcendental  philosophy  of  spirit,  Schelling  now  adds  a  philos- 
ophy of  identity  in  which  all  things  are  seen  under  the  Spino/is- 
tic  'sub  specie  aeternatis'  and  is  thus  lead  back  to  the  Absolute 
Identity  in  which  all  plurality  is  transcended.  In  the  aesthetic 
consciousness,  he  concludes,  we  are  at  once  both  finite  and 
infinite,  and  our  final  interpretation  of  the  world  is  artistic 
rather  than  scientific;  the  beautiful  is  the  perfect  realization  ot 
the  union  of  the  subjective  and  objective — an  identity  toward 
which  thought  is  moving  but  which  art  alone  can  accomplish. 
In  art,  therefore,  the  antithesis  between  the  real  and  the  ideal, 
between  reason  and  desire,  between  thought  and  conduct,  dis- 
appears, so  that  art  becomes  the  solution  ot  all  the  problems  of 
reflection.^ 

Hcgcl. 

With  Hegel  the  cpistcmological  jnoblem  is  opened  anew  and 
instead  of  the  postulate  of  the  Absolute  Indifference  of  Schell- 
ing, in  jiroposes  the  Absolute  of  immanent  activity.  The 
Absolute  is  not  substance  bui  self-conscious  Spirit,  and  the  unity 
of  consciousness  is  the  principle  troin  which  all  things  issue  and 
to  whicli  they  are  to  iu'  referred  tor  their  final  explanation. 
From  I  he  Cartesian  opposition  of  mind  and  matter,  neither 
Kant,  nor  Schelling,  nor  Fichfe,  was  al^lt    to  tr»-e  himself.      In 

'  lalckcubcrg.  History  of  Mod.  Phil.,  p.  456. 


MODER.W  THOUGHT.  I37 

each  instance  the  epistemological  problem  was  occasioned  by 
the  presence  of  an  extraneous  principle,  so  that  the  solution  of 
the  problem  thus  presented  could  be  found  only  in  ji;oin«i;  beyond 
consciousness.  But  for  Hegel,  the  conscious  spirit  is  the  real 
presupposition  and  the  ideal  end  of  all  things.  According  to 
Schelling,  subject  and  object  proceed  from  the  Absolute,  which 
is,  in  succession,  nature  and  spirit,  whereas  with  Hegel,  the 
Absolute  becomes  successiveh'  subject  and  object,  nature  and 
spirit,  or  in  the  words  of  Turner,  Hegel's  Absolute  is  a  "process 
rather  than  a  source,  an  infinite  of  activit\'  rather  than  one  of 
static  immensity  and  undifferentiated  plentitude,  a  maelstrom 
rather  than  a   sea  ot   unruffled   rest."' 

Fichte  attempted  to  solve  the  epistemological  problem  set  by 
Kant  by  reducing  the  'thing-in-itselt'  to  one  of  its  aspects, 
while  Schelling  made  the  'thing-in-itselt'  an  Absolute  identity. 
The  motive  in  each  instance  was  to  Hnd  a  common  principle 
from  which  the  dualism  of  subject  and  object  issued.  The 
limitation  of  each  attempt  is  to  be  found  in  the  necessity  of  seek- 
ing the  support  and  sanction  of  thought  and  conduct  bexond 
consciousness  which  could  be  realized  onh'  in  terms  of  some 
mystical  or  ecstatic  immediacx'.  The  advance  in  Ilegel  is  to 
be  seen  in  the  ma  kino;  of  the  Absolute  the  common  source  of  the 
ego  and  the  non-ego.  In  fact  Hegel  makes  the  process  itself 
the  Absolute. 

This  movement,  however,  has  its  own  law  and  goal.  1  hese 
are  not  due  to  the  action  of  some  external  agency  but  are 
immanent  in  the  process.  Reason  is  the  law  and  self-conscious 
reason  is  the  goal  of  the  process.  Reason,  therefore,  and  the 
Absolute  are  identical  and  thought  is  the  source  and  sum  of  all 
reality.  Beinjr  is  only  thoutiht  realized  ami  becoming  is  only 
the  development  of  thought.  Philosophy  can  not  transcend 
rational  experience  since  onlv  the  rational  is  real  and  philosophy 
must  be  in   harmony  with   actuality  and  experience.' 

According  to  Hegel  philosophy  starts  with  the  'idea,'  as  the 
system  of  reason  and  the  sum  of  reality.      I  his  all-comprehen- 


'  Turner,  Hist,  of  Philosophy,  p.  562. 
'  Wallace,  The  Logic  of  Hcgcl,  p.  10. 


138  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

sive  idea  follows  a  law  of  development  whose  end  is  determined 
withm  the  process  and  in  the  course  of  its  development  passes 
through  three  definite  stages  whicii  constitute  the  three  divisions 
of  philosophy.  In  each  of  these  three  divisions,  there  is  a 
further  triatlic  division,  so  that  each  constitutes,  as  it  were,  a 
microcosm,  whde  the  three  make  up  an  all-inclusive  macrocosm. 
It  necessarily  follows  that  the  first,  as  dealing  with  the  idea  as 
the  whole  of  realir\ ,  will  be  of  the  greatest  importance  in  the 
Hegelian  system.  Logic,  therefore,  as  the  science  of  things  held 
in  thought,  and  thus  identical  with  metaphysics,  has  to  do  with 
the  several  stages  through  which  the  idea  passes,  from  the 
earliest  stage  of  immediacy,  in  which  there  is  no  distinction 
between  being  and  non-being,  to  the  stage  in  which  the  idea 
from  the  stage  of  reflection  passes  back  into  itself  again  in 
another  and  higher  immediacy. 

The  'notion,'  according  to  Hegel,  is  being  returned  to  its  own 
immediacy  or,  as  he  himself  puts  it,  the  notion  is  the  principle 
of  freedom,  the  power  of  substance  self-realized.  As  contain- 
ing all  the  earlier  categories,  the  notion  is  the  truth  of  being — the 
realization  of  totality  and  must  be  regarded  as  semblant  since 
the  'other'  ot  the  notion  is  not  really  another.  The  contradic- 
tion thus  involved  between  the  notion  as  idea,  and  thai  which  is 
not  notion,  except  in  a  semblant  way,  disappears  in  the  idea  as 
the  absolute  notion,  which  Hegel  defines  as  the  union  of  the 
notion  and  its  objectivity,  of  the  real  and  the  ideal,  of  soul  and 
body.  I  ruth  is  the  absolute  notion  become  its  own  object  in 
the  theoretical  sphere.  The  Good  is  the  absolute  notion  become 
its  own  object  in  the  practical  realm.  But  when  the  notion 
returns  to  itself  from  the  limitations  of  the  true  and  the  good, 
the  finiteness  of  cognition  and  volition,  it  becomes  the  absolute 
idea.     This  represents  the  goal  of  the  logical  processes. 

In  its  next  stage,  the  Idea  passes  into  otherness  and  becomes 
nature,  which  Hegel  defines  as  'the  Idea  in  state  of  otherness,' 
a  state  midway  between  ihr  immediac\'  of  reason  as  notion,  and 
thi'  redintegrated  immediacy  of  reason  as  fulh'  realized  in  the 
spirit.  In  nature  the  Idea  has  been  particularized  and  external- 
ized and  natural  science  is  justified  in  regarding  phenomena  as 
isolated  realities  and  in  dealing  with  the  universe  in   piecemeal 


yfODERX  THOUGHT.  I  39 

fashion  rather  than  as  a  whole.  But  pliilosopli}-  takes  a  higher 
point  of  view,  and  represents  the  Idea  as  attaining  again  its 
unity  and  identity  in  man,  who  is  the  goal  of  nature's  processes. 
In  the  individual,  as  in  nature,  the  Idea  passes  through  a  three- 
fold stage  of  development  as  subjective,  objective  and  absolute 
Spirit. 

By  the  subjective  mind,  Hegel  refers  to  the  soul,  conscious- 
ness, and  the  several  psychical  processes.  The  highest  realiza- 
tion of  this  phase  of  mind  is  to  be  found  in  the  "free  will  as 
intelligence."'  But  this  freedom  is  acquired  only  as  the  mind 
comes  to  complete  self-consciousness.     At  the  first  mind  was 

A 

whollv  immersed  in  nature.  When  it  came  to  the  recognition 
of  itself  as  the  Ego,  it  divested  itself  of  nature  and  as  theoretical 
mind  made  itself  the  determiner  of  its  own  intuitions  and 
thoughts.  Then,  by  means  of  the  impulses,  desires  and  inclina- 
tions, it  proceeded  to  determine  its  own  contents  thus  arriving 
at  a  complete  self-determination,  which  is  freedom.  The  entire 
procedure  is,  however,  purely  theoretical,  as  contrasted  with  the 
purely  practical  character  of  the  manifestations  of  the  objective 
mind.  In  both  instances,  the  mind  is  in  a  state  of  otherness, 
as  Hegel  would  say,  meaning  doubtless  that  whatever  control 
the  mind  exercises  in  either  the  theoretical  or  the  practical 
sphere,  is  mediate  in  character. 

But  the  Idea  passes  into  a  state  of  otherness,  only  that  it  may 
return  enriched  and  deepened  into  itself  again.  The  absolute 
mind,  in  which  the  antithesis  between  the  theoretical  and  the 
practical,  the  true  and  the  good,  is  transcended,  represents  the 
complete  realization  of  the  world-process.  It  is  for  Hegel,  a 
conception  ot  the  ideal  in  which  the  soul  becomes  completelv 
unified  with  all  its  finite  manifestations  in  a  richer  and  deeper 
mind.  In  brief  the  Absolute  mind  is  the  mind  with  all  its  mean- 
ing realized. 

But  that  in  which  the  mind  finds  itself  tullv  realized  reveals 
itself  as  an  Ideal  under  three  forms — as  the  beauty  of  Art,  as 
Divine  Perfection  in  God,  and  finally  as  the  Absolute  of  Philoso- 
phw     The  Ideal  thus  becomes  the  sphere  in  which  the  subject 

^Encyclopedia,  sec.  48 1. 


140  THE  AESTHETIC  EXI'ERIESCE. 

knows  itself  as  reconciled  both  with  the  world  of  nature  and  the 
world  of  spirit.  Such  an  absolute  experience,  Hegel  like  Schell- 
ing  finds  in  the  aesthetic  consciousness  and  defines  a  work  of 
art  as  the  representation  of  the  Idea  in  sensuous  existence,  which 
satisfies  alike  the  deniantls  of  theoretical  and  practical  knowl- 
edge and  elevates  the  mind  above  all  forms  of  finitude  to  the 
highest  enjoyment.'  But  all  realitv  is  development  and  the 
principle  of  the  true  philosophy  is  neither  the  abstract  under- 
standing, which  finds  itself  limited  to  the  phenomenal  world, 
nor  a  mystical  intuition  which  attempts  to  reach  the  highest 
knowledge  by  an  easy  and  quick  leap,  but  reason  itself  as  the 
faculty  of  concrete  concepts.  1  he  reconciliation  of  the  several 
antitheses  of  thought,  is  therefore,  neither  impossible  nor  immed- 
iate from  the  outset  of  thought,  but  is  the  result  of  develop- 
ment. Reason  neither  sets  the  opposition  nor  denies  it  but 
proceeds  to  reconcile  the  antithesis,  which  is  the  necessity  of  all 
development.  The  object  ot  plnlosophv  is  the  absolute  as  the 
living  subject  which  posits  distinctions  and  returns  from  them 
to  a  higher  synthesis.  Each  such  synthesis  becomes,  in  rum. 
the  pedestal  for  a  still  higlier  synthesis,  a  platform  upon  w  hich 
higher  modes  of  reality  may  arise. - 

Reality  is  replete  with  contradictions,  but  is  nevertheless 
rational.  The  contradictions  in  which  thought  involves  itself 
are  not  due  to  an  a-logical  mo/r/^;// which  falls  beyond  the  thought 
process,  but  show  rather  the  incentive  and  possibility  of  all 
thought.  1  hese  contradictions  are  not  to  be  annulled  by  a 
return  to  a  more  primtive  consciousness,^  but  rather  to  be  con- 
served by  thinking  the  contradictory  concepts  together  in  a 
higher  synthesis.  For  I  legcl,  the  absolute  thought,  as  the  merg- 
ing of  the  subjective  and  the  objective,  passes  also  through  a 
three-told  stage  of  development,  and  art,  which  is  the  absolute 
in  sensuous  form,  the  infinite  in  the  finite,  must  yield  to  religion 
in  which  the  sensuous  element  of  tiie  tt)rmer  passes  into  a  higlier 
state   of    consciousness    and    l>ecomes    the    in  wart!    life    of    the 

'  Hcgcl,  Philosophy  of  Fine  Art  (Bosanquet's  trs.),  p.  \ ^. 

'  Cf.   Baldwin's  '  llu-ory  of  Genetic  Modes'  in  Development  and  Evolution, 
ch.  xvii  and  .\ix. 

'  ]■  alckinherg,  op,  ctt.,  p.  492. 


MODERN  THOUGHT.  I4I 

emotional  nature.  As  art  was  the  reconciliation  ot  the  sensuous 
and  the  Ideal,  a  reconciliation  in  which  the  sensuous  prevailed, 
so  religion  is  the  reconciliation  of  feeling  and  thought  in  which 
the  emotional  nature  holds  the  chief  place. 

But  in  religion,  the  contradiction  is  between  thought  and  the 
emotional  nature,  which  phdosophv  alone  is  able  to  resolve. 
Philosophv  thus  becomes  the  highest  form  under  which  the 
Absolute  manifests  itself.  There  is  here  a  complete  return  to 
thought,  the  circle  is  made  complete,  and  tin-  jirocess  may 
repeat  itself  but  can  not  reach  a  higher  stage.  The  contradic- 
tion in  the  religious  consciousness  provokes  free  speculative 
thought  with  which  logic  or  the  science  of  thought  as  it  is  in 
and  for  itself,  has  to  do.  Having  thus  returned  to  itself,  there 
can  be  no  further  development  and  the  process  can  onl\'  repeat 
itself.  The  Idea,  as  the  Absolute,  is  the  process  of  develop- 
ment actualized,  and  philosophy,  as  the  science  of  the  actualiza- 
tion of  the  Absolute  Idea  is,  "The  highest,  freest  and  wisest 
phase  of  the  union  of  the  subjective  and  the  objective  mind  and 
the  ultimate  goal  of  all  development." 

The  absolute  Idea  as  the  synthesis  of  the  objective  and  the 
subjective  notion  becomes  the  platform  for  a  further  determina- 
tion upon  the  part  of  the  Idea  itself.  The  syntheses  thus  far 
effected  are  to  be  explained  as  imaginative  constructions  from 
the  images  and  ideas  derived  from  the  data  of  intuition.  Ihev 
are  still,  as  Hegel  calls  them,  more  or  less  concrete,  individual- 
ized creations.  But  with  the  rise  of  the  absolute  Idea,  thought 
has  been  so  far  perfected  as  to  no  longer  need  help  for  its  intui- 
tions. As  reason,  its  first  movement  was  the  appropriation  of  the 
immediate  datum  which  makes  it  universal;  but  with  the  attain- 
ment of  the  absolute  Idea,  it  proceeds  to  give  the  character  of  an 
existent  to  the  materials  thus  far  perfected  In  the  process  of 
'Auto-intuition.'  A  construction  of  such  character  can  arise  onlv 
when  thought  has  reached  that  stage  of  its  unfoldment  at  which 
its  ideas  are  accepted  as  its  own  and  whicli,  under  its  own 
positive  coefficients  of  control,  can  be  used  tor  the  sake  of  the 
embodiment  of   further  meaniniis. 

The  absolute  Idea  appears  successively  as  Nature  and  Mind, 
thus  furnishing  the  subject-matter  of  two  independent  disc:- 


142  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPCRIE\CE. 

plines.  Nature  is  the  Idea  (reason')  in  the  state  of  otherness — a 
state  mid-way  between  the  immediacy  of  the  notion  and  the 
immediacy  of  reason  as  fully  realized.  In  nature,  the  Idea  has 
once  more  lost  its  unity,  and  appears  as  a  series  of  independent 
particulars.  It  passes  through  a  series  of  stages  and  at  last 
comes  to  self-consciousness  in  the  individual.  Here  once  more 
it  passes  through  the  three-fold  stages  of  development.  Dchn- 
ing  the  formal  essence  of  the  mind  as  freedom,  Hegel  holds  that 
it  is  only  as  the  mind  arrives  at  complete  self-consciousness, 
that  the  mind  attains  perfect  freedom.  Only  by  successive  acts 
ot  knowledge  does  the  mind  emancipate  itself  from  foreign 
control.  The  recognition  of  the  ego  means  the  attainment  of 
inner  freedom  of  determination.  Having  assumed  the  deter- 
mination of  its  own  ideas,  intuitions  and  thoughts,  the  mind 
proceeds  by  means  of  the  impulses  and  desires  to  fashion  this 
content  for  the  sake  of  the  satisfaction  of  theoretical  and  practi- 
cal interests.  But  freedom  thus  attained  must  be  realized,  per- 
fected, and  this  can  be  accomplished  only  through  necessity, 
as  its  opposite.  For  this  reason  alone,  the  mind  objectifies 
itself  in  law,  the  family  and  the  state.  But  in  the  most  perfect 
objectification  the  mind  is  limited.  The  subjective  mind  can 
not  always  find  itself  perfectly  expressed  in  the  objective.  The 
former  is  always  running  in  advance  of  the  latter  and  making 
demands  which  the  latter  can  not  satisfy. 

But  since  the  antithesis  is  of  the  mind's  own  making,  it  can 
also  be  synthesized  by  the  mind,  so  that  the  mind,  having 
objectified  itself,  completes  the  circle  of  development  by  return- 
ing to  itself  again,  thus  becoming  identical  with  itself  and  as 
being  subject  to  itself  alone,  becomes  the  Absolute  Mind,  as 
embodied  in  art,  religion  and  philosophy.  The  theory  of  art 
has  already  been  dealt  with,  and  it  needs  only  to  be  added  in 
the  present  connection,  that  it  again  becomes  the  organ  of 
immediacy  and  supplies  a  synthesis  of  nature  and  mind,  which 
at  once  becomes  the  platform  of  a  higher  construction  as 
embodied  in  religion  and  philosophy.'  1  lie  latter,  however, 
becomes  for  Hegel  the  reconciliation  of  art  in  which  the  sen- 

'  Hegel,  Introduction  to  Philosophy  of  Fine  Art  (Bosanquet's  trs.),  p.  13. 


MODKRX  TllorCHT.  I43 

suous  prevailed  and  religion  in  which  rhe  emotions  prevailed. 
In  both  art  and  rehgion  the  truth  is  revealed  symbolically, 
whereas  in  phik)S()phv,  it  is  revealed  as  reason,  and  is  therefore 
superior  to  both  art  and  religion. 

It  has  been  shown,  1  think,  that  the  aesthetic  consciousness 
in  the  treatment  of  Hegel  developed  with  the  epistemological 
and  that  it  became  in  every  instance  the  organ  of  a  higher  syn- 
thesis. In  the  instance  of  the  epistemological  problem  of  the 
reflective  consciousness,  as  Hegel  regards  reflection,  the  aes- 
thetic consciousness  again  becomes  that  phase  of  experience  in 
which  higher  aspect  of  reality  is  immediately  disclosed.  Art 
is  thus  the  Absolute  Mind  disclosed,  not  as  something  behind 
the  sensuous  form,  but  in  the  sensuous  form,  giving  it  its  form 
and  meaning.  Art,  therefore,  is  not  a  matter  of  inference,  but 
something  to  which  to  come  immediateh'.'  In  religion  also 
reality  is  manifested  in  an  immediacy  of  consciousness.  In 
ethics  the  mind  is  always  confronted  with  the  knowledge  that 
beyond  the  present  act,  lies  another,  which  has  to  be  accom- 
plished. Duty  always  connotes  and  involves  another,  thus 
illustrating  the  relationship  of  the  one  and  the  many.  The 
moral  consciousness  is  capable  of  endless  progress  and  the  selt 
could  never  reach  its  goal  through  it.  But  in  religion,  which  is 
the  surrender  of  the  will  of  the  individual,  and  the  acceptance 
of  the  will  of  God,  the  self  finds  its  true  life,  thus  ending  the 
moral  struggle  by  the  attainment  of  the  end  of  the  moral  lite  in 
an  immediacy  of  consciousness.  But  Hegel,  whose  tempera- 
ment was  wholly  idealistic,  sees  here  a  contradiction,  which  can 
be  overcome  only  in  terms  of  pure  thought.  Nevertheless  one 
can  not  read  the  Philosophy  of  Fine  Art  without  retaining  the 
conviction,  that  the  aesthetic  consciousness,  as  the  organ  of 
transcendence,  does  after  all  aftord  the  only  ultimate  view  of 
reality.  We  do  not  get  rid  of  our  finiteness  in  our  j^hilosojihi/- 
ing,  bur  in  art  and  religion,  according  to  Hegel,  we  come  into 
immediate  knowledge  of  those  deeper  aspects  of  reality  which 
are  in  their  nature  ultimate  and  thus  form  the  very  basis  of  our 
finite  existence. 


Ibii 


144  ^^'J^  AESTHETIC  EXPFRIEXCE. 

Thar  the  rational  alone  is  real,  implies  that  reason  has  no 
limitations,  l-.vervthing  real  is  iiltimatelv  analvzable  into  terms 
of  rational  thoii<ihr.  How  inacle(]iiare  this  conception  of  reality 
is,  is  to  be  inferred  from  the  reactions  that  at  once  arose  against 
it  with  their  characteristic  insistence  upon  the  importance  of  the 
non-rational.  The  attempt  to  bring  the  whole  of  realitv  under 
a  single  principle  certamK  represents  the  goal  of  philosophic 
endeavor,  hut  such  principle  can  not  be  reached  bv  neglecting 
or  ignoring  either  of  the  several  aspects  and  demands  of  the 
conscious  life. 

It  can  not  be  denied  that  the  attempt  of  Hegel  to  completely 
unify  the  element  of  the  Kantian  jihilos()ph\'  represents  the  most 
comprehensive  view  of  the  problems  of  philosophy  hitherto 
found.  No  department  of  human  knowledge  was  untouched  by 
it  and  there  was  none  that  did  not  feel  its  influence.  B\  making 
thought  'common'  rather  than  purely  individual,  as  it  had 
hitherto  been,  and  by  making  so  large  use  of  the  notion  «>{ 
'development,'  his  philosophy  was  made  to  represent  the  embodi- 
ments of  rhf  highest  aspirations  of  the  last  century. 

But  his  attempt  to  bring  the  whole  of  reality  under  one  prin- 
ciple of  the  mind  brought  about  its  immediate  failure.  Immedi- 
ately after  his  death  there  arose  a  certain  mystical  and  pessi- 
mistic reaction  against  his  system.  The  vast  and  rapid  accu- 
mulation of  scientific  knowledge,  the  increased  daring  of  the 
human  mind  and  the  larger  control  over  the  external  world  dur- 
ing  the  past  century,  tended  to  the  weakening  of  the  rationalistic 
explanation  of  the  universe.  Predicates  were  daih'  arising  that 
could  not  be  analyzed  out  of  the  subject  and  reality  was  coming 
to  be  felt  as  larger  than  thought.  Subject  and  object  could  no 
longer  be  kept  upon  the  same  basis  of  realit\-  in  iniie  thought 
and  the  subject  at  once  sought  to  erect  its  own  object;  and  since 
thousht  has  failed  resource  again  is  souiilit  in  the  aflfective- 
volitional  aspect  of  consciousness.  With  Schopenhauer,  the 
\\  ill-activity  of  the  mind,  is  brought  into  prominence,  as  the 
creator  of  the  world. 

According  to  Schopenhauer,  the  world  is  not  a  mere  appear- 
ance, as  Kant  thought,  but  rather  a  worKl  whose  reality  is  to  be 
sought   in  ;i   Mind  force  struggling  for  self-conscious  assertion. 


MODER.W  THOUGHT.  I45 

The  \\  ill  thus  becomes  the  'thing-in-itself.'  Will,  not  thought, 
is  the  ultimate  principle  of  the  mind  and  thought  is  but  the 
reflection  ot  will.'  The  affective-conative  tendencies,  as  the 
struggle  of  inner  forces  for  objective  expression,  is  to  be  made 
the  true  basis  of  philosophy  and  the  only  approach  to  the 
Absolute. 

Schopenhauer's  epistemologv  is  summed  up  in  the  expres- 
sion 'Die  Welt  ist  meine  Vorstellung.'  The  ideas  are  not  to  be 
thought  of  as  given  archetypes  of  an  external  reality,  but  pre- 
sentations created  bv  the  subject  from  the  principle  of  'suffi- 
cient reason'  {zuretcheuden  Grutide).  The  innermost  reality 
of  the  world  is  to  be  sought  in  subjective  struggle,  as  an  uncon- 
scious force  behind  the  world  of  appearance.  But  by  insisting 
that  the  innermost  reality  of  the  Absolute  as  Will  can  never  be 
known  to  consciousness,  Schopenhauer,  at  once  reduces  his 
system  to  a  mystic  pantheism. - 

But  having  defined  the  Absolute  Schopenhauer  attempts  a 
definition  of  the  world  of  presented  fact.  This  he  finds  to  be 
only  successive  modifications  of  the  will.  Each  successive  objec- 
tification  of  the  will  represents  an  embodiment  of  the  'will-to- 
be.'  The  world  of  presentations  thus  comes  to  be  a  reflection 
of  the  will  and,  therefore,  dependent  upon  the  subject  which 
perceives  it.  The  subject  can  not  get  beyond  itself.  The 
object  of  knowledge  is  a  wholly  relative  thing,  created  by  the 
subject  under  the  a  prion  laws  of  thought.^ 

But  while  the  world  of  presentation  is  wholh'  determined 
by  the  subject  as  the  knower,  consciousness  nevertheless  points 
to  a  higher  world  which  does  not  depend  upon  the  subject. 
This  world,  which  to  Kant  remained  wholly  beyond  the  limits 
of  experience,  is,  according  to  Schopenhauer  fiirced  upon  us  in 
an  act  of  belief.  To  know  one's  own  self  necessitates  the 
knowledge  of  things  beyond  one's  self.  Neither  subject  nor 
object  can  stand  alone.  Kither  would  be  mcanmgless  apart 
from  the  other.  The  self  is,  thercfi)re,  both  the  subject  and 
object  of  thought.     "I  know  myself,"  he  continues,  *'as  the  object 

•  Die  ff'elt  ah  tfiUe  unJ  forsullung,  iJk.  I\'. 

'  Pern',  Approach  to  Philosophy,  p.  2QO;  HofFding,  o/>,  f«/.,  Vol.  II,  pp.  235  ff. 

^  Die  ff'elt  (lis  ff'ille  u.   f'orstellung.  Vol.  I,  pp.  3  ff. 


146  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

of  thought  of  Others  and  thus  an  object  of  thought  along  with 
other  objects."  The  chasm  between  thinking  subject  and 
objects  of  thought  is  thus  partially  transcended,' 

In  making  the  subject  and  object  of  knowledge  alike  the 
products  ot  will,  Schopenhauer  followed  in  the  path  marked  out 
by  Fichte.  He  makes  will  the  essence  of  the  world  and  also  the 
nature  of  man,  so  that  the  world  can  be  known  only  through 
man.  1  he  common  essence  of  each  is  however  grounded,  not 
m  appearance,  but  in  the  'thing-in-itself.'  Will  thus  becomes 
both  the  phenomenal  and  the  noumenal.  It  is  precisely  here 
that  the  epistemologicalproblemof  Schopenhauer  really  appears. 
How  can  will,  which  is  known  by  means  of  ideas,  be  identical 
with  the  will  as  the  'thing-in-itself.''  He  appears  to  have  appre- 
ciated, what  had  not  hitherto  been  appreciated,  that  the  phe- 
nomenal and  the  noumenal  can  not  be  separated  in  any  absolute 
way.  But  despite  the  fact  that  his  conception  of  the  will  is 
elementary  and  his  general  psychology  romantic  rather  than 
scientific,  Schopenhauer  himself  realized  that  the  will  is 
dualistic  and  hence  a  problem  within  itself,  which  the  will  can 
not  of  itself  solve.  Knowledge  is  brought  into  being  as  the 
servant  of  the  will  but  can  not  in  any  possible  manner  influence 
the  will.  Moreover  the  will  remains  identical  throughout  all 
stages  of  the  development  of  knowledge.  Only  therefore  in  a 
higher  type  of  knowledge  can  will  escape  from  its  characteristic 
bondage,  the  Urplianomcuy  in  which  the  will  as  it  is  in  itself  is 
presented.  But  since  the  Urphanomen  can  not  be  reached  in 
terms  of  ideas,  Schopenhauer  turns  to  the  aesthetic  experience 
and  finds  that  it  is  only  in  art  as  the  goal  of  human  striving  that 
all  pain  and  suffering  cease.  Knowledge  is  always  proceeding 
from  one  ground  to  another  and  will  is  ever  striving  anxiously 
forward  after  that  which  it  is  not,  but  in  artistic  contemplation, 
in  \\hich  all  things  are  seen  sub  specie  acternatis,  the  terrible 
struggle  for  existence  is  ended.  Defining  tiie  cpistemological 
problem  of  Schopenhauer  as  the  unification  and  realization  of 
the  will  as  a  dualistic  experience,  the  solution  reached  was  in 
terms  of  the  aesthetic  experience,  as  an  experience  of  an  immed- 
iacy of  will. 

'  Il>iil..  \'ol.  II,  pp.  7j6ir. 


MODERl^  THOUGHT.  1 47 

It  is  unnecessary  to  pursue  this  historical  investigation 
further,  since  the  characteristic  episteinological  theories  ot"  more 
recent  times  are  the  suhject  of  critical  investigation  in  an  earhcr 
chapter.'  Until  the  idealistic  reaction  a  half  century  ago  psy- 
chology was  rather  epistemology,  and  the  subject  of  experience 
was  interpreted  in  terms  of  content  established  apart  from  the 
mind  perceiving  it.  That  psychology  has  so  long  been  in  the 
'gall  of  metaph}sics  and  the  bonds  of  ontology'  is  due  to  the 
failure  to  apply  to  the  material  with  which  it  has  to  do  the  same 
methods — and  in  the  same  spirit — which  have  for  a  long  time  been 
applied  to  the  treatment  of  external  phenomena.  The  failure 
of  the  current  epistemological  theories  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact 
that  the  mind,  as  the  subject  term  of  the  currently  recognized 
dualism,  is  not  treated  as  being  under  definite  and  continuous 
laws  of  development.  As  in  the  earlier  periods  already  dis- 
cussed, the  mind  as  the  inner  aspect  of  the  dualism  of  current 
discussion  remains  the  'undigested'  element  in  the  theory  of 
knowledge.  But  our  point  has  been  to  show  that  in  the  earlier 
dualistic  experiences  solution  was  found  by  carrying  over  into  the 
inner  the  coefficients  under  which  the  outer  was  held  and  guaran- 
teed and  thus  made  material  for  the  embodiment  of  inner  purposes. 
The  failure  to  follow  out  such  precedent  in  the  treatment  of  the 
epistemological  problem  presented  by  the  subject-object  dualism, 
has  motived  the  setting  up  of  a  number  of  defective  and  limited 
theories  of  knowledge.  Within  a  dualistic  experience  it  is 
possible  always  for  consciousness  to  proceed  in  either  of  two 
directions,  so  that  we  are  to  expect  materialistic  and  mechanical 
theories  on  the  one  hand  and  idealistic  and  humanistic  theories 
on  the  other.  But  the  several  theories  which  proceed  by 
emphasizing  the  one  term  of  the  dualistic  experience  to  the 
exclusion  of  the  other  have  been  weighed  in  the  balance  and 
found  wanting,  and  as  after  similar  attempts  at  a  solution  of 
earlier  dualisms,  so  now,  there  is  a  general  movement  toward 
a  more  idealistic  solution.-  Repeated  attempts  have  been  made 
to  identify  the  self  with  some  content,  either  intellectual  or 
volitional,  and  in  either  instance,  it  has  been  found  that  neither 

'  Chapter  iv. 

'  C(.  Paulsen,  Introduction  to  Philosophy,  p.  xiv. 


148  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIES'CE. 

thought  nor  vohtion  is  ahle  to  completely  harmonize  its  own 
content.  The  conclusion  has  thus  been  reached,  that  reality 
as  an  absolute  experience,  can  be  neither  thought  nor  will,  but 
some  form  of  immediacy  of  experience,  in  which  both  alike  are 
completed.  So  long  as  thought  remains  thought  it  is  neces- 
sarily less  than  the  whole  of  reality  which  it  seeks  to  know,  so 
that  reality  must  always  contain  an  aspect  which  can  not  be 
apprehended  in  thought.  Moreover  thought  is  always  general, 
while  reality  must  necessarily  be  also  singular  and  immediate. 
But  while  thought  is  always  seeking  to  comprehend  the  singular, 
it  is  found  that  the  singular  can  not  as  such  become  the  actual 
content  of  thought  and  so  remains  as  an  'intent'  meaning  in 
consciousness.' 

And  likewise  of  the  will.  For  as  has  been  indicated,  the 
will  implies  the  possession  of  and  the  motivation  by  the  contrast 
between  existence  as  it  at  present  is  and  as  it  should  be  for  the 
actualization  and  realization  of  ends  in  experience.  It  also, 
like  thought,  implies  a  separation  of  content  and  its  references,^ 
while  reality  can  only  be  found  in  :in  experience  in  whicli  these 
two  aspects  are  finally  united  in  :in  immediacy  ot  will,  nn 
experience  in  which,  as  Professor  Royce  says,  'the  will  wills  its 
own  will,'  or  better,  an  experience  in  which  the  will  by  willing 
fulfills  its  own  will.  But  an  object  in  wliich  the  will  finds  itself 
fully  reflected  is  necessarily  an  ideal  object  and  therefore  a  form 
of  'intent'  rather  than  content.  Hence  in  the  case  of  the  Intel- 
lectualists  and  the  Voluntarists  alike,  reality,  as  an  absolute 
experience  in  which  thought  loses  its  generality  and  mediacy 
and  will  its  privacy  and  intent  of  struggle,  is  not  reached.  I'or 
the  one,  reality  remains  a-logical,  for  the  other  a-volitional.  In 
short  each  fails  to  reduce  the  term  of  the  dualism  embraced  by 
the  other. 

Both  types  of  epistemological  theory  agree  that  reality,  as 
the  object  of  knowledge,  must  issue  from  the  subject,  while  the 
mystical  resort  in  the  case  of  each  appears  in  the  attempt  to  set 
up  an  ideal  object  as  an  intent  meaning,  which  somehow  falls 
beyond   the   process  to  which   it   makes   its  exclusive    appeal. 

'  See  li.ildwin,  Thought  and  Things,  \'o\.  II,  di.ips.  xiv,  xv. 

'  Prof.  Haldwin's  dualism  of 'fact  and  end.'  Ibid.,  \'oI.  11,  chaps,  xiii  and  .\iv. 


MODERX  THOUGHT.  1 49 

Such  experience  may  be  found  in  undifferentiated  and  unrelated 
feeling,  as  an  experience  in  which  the  several  aspects  of  th()u<;ht 
and  volition  are  merged  in  an  unbroken  immediacy;  hence  both 
alike  tend  to  set  up  some  such  experience  as  the  type  of  reality 
in  an  absolute  experience 

Closer  analysis  reveals  the  fact  that  these  two  types  of  epistem- 
ological  theory  represent  severally  aspects  of  human  experi- 
ence, either  of  which  is  meaningless  and  valueless  apart  from 
the  other.  The  apparently  empty  and  meaningless  outcome 
of  these  several  attempts  point  the  way,  at  least,  in  which  the 
future  solution  of  the  epistemological  problem  of  leHection  lies. 
Both  thought  and  conduct  are  implicated  in  anv  fruitful  and 
significant  theory  of  reality.  Some  way  out  must  be  found 
whereby  consciousness  ma^'  regain  its  immediacy,  without 
breaking  with  its  entire  life  of  achievement,  and  thus  falling 
short  of  the  full  meanino;  of  thought  and  volition.  The  mystical 
(in  the  sense  of  affectivistic),  outcome  of  the  Intellectualistic 
and  the  Voluntaristic  theories  of  knowledge  and  reality,  is  to  be 
inferred  from  the  fact  that  neither  can  reach  an  absolute  experi- 
ence without  breaking  with  the  meanings  already  acquired  in 
consciousness.  But  why  stop  the  constructive  process  at  this 
point .''  Since  the  dualism  falls  wholly  within  consciousness, 
is  in  fact  of  consciousness'  own  making,  why  not  look  also 
within  consciousness  for  a  hisrher  mode  of  construction  in  which 
the  fragmentary  and  limited  meanings  are  transcended  .'  More- 
over it  has  been  the  burden  of  the  present  attempt  to  indicate 
the  fact  that  consciousness  has  reached  the  dualism  of  subject 
and  object  only  by  transcending  a  series  of  earlier  dualistic  expe- 
riences. Each  such  experience  found  its  completion  by  a  process 
of  reading  forward  of  the  meanings  then  present  in  conscious- 
ness. The  transcending  of  the  earlier  dualistic  experiences  was 
not  reached  by  ignoring  the  meanings  then  present,  so  that  the 
resulting  construction,  represented  m  each  instance,  not  an 
empty,  but  the  fullest  and  richest  possible  experience.  It 
Mysticism  means  a  theory  of  knowledge  and  reality  reached 
and  realized  only  in  unanalv/ed  and  undifferentiated  feeling, 
our  outcome  is  not  mystical;  for  the  aesthetic  experience 
in    the    several    stages    of   its    development    brings    unity  and 


150  THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

completion  to  an  otherwise  incomplete  and  clualistic  experi- 
ence by  setting  up,  in  a  schematic  way,  a  farther  and  richer 
meaning.  In  terms  of  the  semblant  consciousness  a  wav  has 
been  found  whereby  consciousness  may  transcend  itself  without 
ignoring  or  breaking  with  its  already  acquired  meanings.  Lack- 
ing such  method  of  treatment  of  meanings  already  present  in 
consciousness,  both  Bradley  and  Royce  are  driven  in  the  ^nd 
to  set  up  a  form  of  'sheer  sentience'  and  'volitional  immediacy' 
in  which  the  essential  character  and  meaning  alike  of  the  Intel- 
lect and  Will  are  wanting.  The  conclusion  of  the  present 
attempt  is,  that  in  the  aesthetic  experience  we  have  a  mode  of 
conscious  construction  in  which  the  dualistic  character  of 
thought  and  will  are  transcended  without  sacrificing  the  essential 
meanings  of  either.' 

Such  a  solution  of  the  epistemological  problem  presented  by 
the  dualistic  character  of  reflective  experience,  can  be  reached 
only  when  both  types  of  experience,  isolated  by  the  Intellectual- 
ists  and  the  Voluntarists  respectively  for  methodological  pur- 
poses, become  the  subject-matter  of  a  new  and  higher  mode  of 
conscious  construction.  Knch  successive  determination  of 
thought  has  been  reached  only  by  an  increasinjr  determinateness 
of  its  fwo-fold  aspect,  content  and  control.  At  each  higher 
mode  of  conscious  determination  both  the  content  and  the 
control  are  deepened  and  furthered,  the  former  by  the  taking 
over  into  the  objective,  as  a  sphere  of  guaranteed  content,  what 
had  before  been  inner  as  the  undetermined,  the  latter  by  a  proc- 
ess of  retreating  into  a  further  'inner'  whose  kernel  is  the  sense 
of  agency  and  control.  The  significance  of  reflection  is  that  it 
marks  that  stage  in  the  development  of  consciousness  at  which 
the  self,  as  the  presupposition  of  control,  is  finally  set  over 
against  the  whole  of  its  content  as  made  up  respectively  of  mind 
and  body.  To  reduce  matter  to  mind  or  mind  to  matter  or 
both  to  some  mystical  principle,  leaves  the  epistemological  prob- 
lem unsolved,  since  the  dualism  of  subject  and  object  remains 
unmediated. 

'  Vide,  Tavlor,  Elements  of  Metaphystcs,  p.  413;  Bradley,  A ppenrance  and 
Reality,  p.  172;  Ro)xe,  The  If  or  I J  and  the  Itidividu(d,  \'ol.  I,  p.  42;  and  Baldwin, 
Thought  and  Things  (\'o\.  I,  I'nfacc,  and  Vol.  II,  Appendix,  II). 


MODERX  THOLGHT.  151 

It  has  been  the  purpose  of  this  historical  invcstitjatii)n  to 
show  that  thought,  ahke  in  the  individual  and  the  race,  has 
reached  the  mode  of  reflection  with  its  characteristic  dualism 
of  subject  and  object,  onlv  by  passing  through  a  series  of  earlier 
dualistic  experiences  in  each  of  which  the  epistemological  prob- 
lem arose  anew,  while  the  solution  of  such  experience  was 
sought  bv  a  resort  to  the  aesthetic  experience.  1  he  epistcm- 
ological  consciousness  is  alwa\'s  dualistic,  while  the  demand 
of  consciousness  is  for  a  self-centered  and  self-controlled  world. 
The  unification  and  objectihcation  of  the  world,  in  terms  of  the 
inner  control  factor,  became  the  epistemological  problem  within 
each  of  the  earlier  dualistic  experiences,  and  remains  so  when 
reflection  is  reached.  But,  regarding  a  dualistic  experience  as 
an  incomplete  experience,  a  conclusion  reached  both  bv  the 
Intellectualists  and  the  Voluntarists,  it  has  already  been  shown 
that  such  experience  can  complete  itself  only  by  the  establish- 
ment of  a  farther  experience,  which,  while  not  as  yet  realized, 
can  nevertheless  be  accepted  and  treated  as  '//  it  were  already 
realized.'  The  object  of  knowledge  in  terms  of  which  our  finite 
and  fragmentary  experience  is  completed  and  interpreted  is, 
as  Kant  already  pointed  out,  the  object  of  a  possible  experience, 
mogliche  Erfahruug.  Knowledge  is,  therefore,  a  process  of 
idealization.  Thought  as  mediate  and  relational,  and  therefore 
finite,  is  always  seeking  an  Other  as  its  own  completion.  Hut 
unless  the  "Absolute  is  content  with  making  eyes  at  itself  in  a 
mirror,  or  like  a  squirrel  in  a  cage  satisfied  in  revolving  in  a 
circle  of  its  own  perfections,"'  the  Other  must  fall  beyond  the 
process  of  thought.  Thought  and  fact  are  not  identical,  and 
for  thought  to  make  them  so  means  the  destruction  of  thought 
itself.  Here  then  is  the  dilemma  of  the  Intt  llcctualists:  How 
can  thought  posit  an  Other,  which,  while  falling  beyond  prestnt 
experience,  is  not  independent  of  all  experience  .'  BradUv 
realizes  the  precise  character  of  the  problem  set  by  a  thorough- 
going Intellectualism  and  reaches  the  conclusion  that  "thought 
to  get  beyond  its  relational  character  and  thus  reach  something 
more  than   truth   must  be  absorbed   into  a  fuller  experience." 

Bradley,  Appearance  and  Reality,  p.   1 72. 


152 


THE  AESTHETIC  EXPERIENCE. 


Tliouglit  can,  therefore,  desire  a  consuinniation  in  wliicli  ir  is 
lost,  a  whole  of  experience  in  which  all  the  elements  of  finite 
experience  would  be  contained  in  an  immediacy  which  is  noth- 
injj  else  than  'sentient  experience.'' 

The  Voluntaristic  theory  of  knowledge  as  most  adequately 
worked  our  hv  Ro\cc  is  brought  face  to  face  with  the  same 
dilemma,  viz:  How  can  tlic  idea  as  an  internal  meaning  set  u]^ 
an  Other  as  an  external  meaning  in  w  hich  the  internal  meaningis 
determinately  embodied  '  "In  seeking  its  object,"  savs  Professor 
Rovce,  "anv  idea  whatever  seeks  absolutely  nothing  but  its  own 
explicit,  and,  in  the  end,  complete  determination  as  this  conscious 
purpose  embodied  in  this  one  way.  The  complete  content  of  the 
idea's  own  purpose  is  the  only  object  of  which  rlie  idea  can  ever 
take  note.  This  alone  is  the  Other  that  is  sought."  "What  is, 
or  what  is  real,  is  as  such  the  complete  embodiment,  in  individual 
form  and  in  final  fulfilment,  of  the  internal  meaning  of  finite 
ideas."  The  Other  of  thought  thus  becomes  a  further  meaning 
in  which  all  partial  and  fragmentary  meanings  are  completely 
embodied,  but  the  fact  remains  that  Professor  Royce  has  nowhere 
shown  how  it  is  possible  for  the  ideas  as  finite  meanings  to  set  up 
a  completed  experience  and  to  treat  it  'as  if  it  were  completely 
present."'-  Thus  despite  the  difference  of  the  premises  from 
which  they  start,  both  the  Intellectualists  and  the  Voluntarists 
arrive  at  the  same  conclusion,  viz.,  that  experience  whether  of 
the  intellectual  or  volitional  type  can  complete  itself  only  in  a 
further  experience;  but  lacking  a  method  whereby  present  mean- 
ings may  be  treated  for  the  sake  of  further  meaning  both  arrive 
at  a  more  or  less  empty  and  meaningless  type  of  reality  as  an 
absolute  experience. 

But  the  extremity  of  the  intellectual  and  the  voluntaristic 
becomes  the  opportunity  of  the  aesthetic,  which  appears  with 
the  epistemological,  and  functions  always  as  the  organ  ot  worKI- 
transcendencc  and  world-completion.  In  the  instance  of  the 
earlier  dualistic  experiences,  reconciliation  and  completion  were 
secured,  not  in  terms  of  meanings  already  acquired,  but  always 

'  Ibid,  cli.  XV. 

'  Royce,  The  World  and  the  Individual,  Lecture  VII,  on  'Tht   Internal  and 
External  Meaning  of  Ideas.' 


MODERX  THOUGHT.  I  53 

by  a  schematic  treatment  of  meanings  already  present  for  the 
sake  of  further  meaning.  Each  such  reconcihation  and  unifi- 
cation represents  an  increasing  determinateness  of  the  two 
aspects  of  thought  already  distinguislied  as  content  and  control, 
and  the  resulting  immediacy  of  experience  is  due  to  the  ereccion 
of  a  'semblant'  object  under  the  presupposition  of  'inner'  con- 
trol with  which  the  'inner'  as  the  subject  of  experience  identifies 
itself  by  a  process  variously  named  but  coming  into  general 
recognition  of  'Einfiihling''  (Lipps),  'absorption'-  (Mitchell), 
and  'sympathetic  or  semblant  projection'^  (Baldwin). 

With  the  rise  of  reflection,  and  the  subject-object  dualism, 
the  subject  term  functioning  in  each  instance  as  presupposition 
of  a  control,  there  is  a  re-distribution  of  contents  for  the  sake  of 
common  reflection.  Two  types  of  meaning  are  present  and 
issue  respectively  in  two  types  of  judgment  as  the  embodiments 
of  the  theoretical  and  the  practical  interest  respectively.  But 
it  has  been  pointed  out  that  in  both  thinking  and  acting  the 
subject  is  more  than  either  thought  or  conduct.  Neither  type 
of  experience  is  able  to  render  the  whole  of  its  own  peculiar 
meaning,  while  at  the  same  time  it  tends  to  minimize  the  mean- 
ing peculiar  to  the  other.  The  essential  point  in  the  present 
connection  is  that  both  types  of  experience  are  dualistic  and 
remain  so,  so  that  to  destroy  this  dualistic  character  means  to 
deprive  both  of  whatever  meaning  they  have  acquired.  Any 
postulate  of  reality  as  an  absolute  experience  reached  by  such 
procedure  will  necessarily  be  a-dualistic,  whether  exprcssctl  m 
terms  of  logical  identity  or  mystical  contemplation. 

But  our  contention  has  been,  and  here  the  matter  must  end, 
that  consciousness  has  developed  from  its  first  immediacy,  as 
an  a-dualistic  experience,  to  the  full-fledged  dualism  of  subject 
and  object,  only  by  a  process  of  semblant  construction,  in  which 
the  two  aspects  of  thought  are  merged  in  a  new  and  higher 
immediacy.  The  'that'  and  the  'what,'  the  existential  reference 
and  the  related  content,  have  arisen  and  developed  together. 
The  resulting  epistemological  probKiii  becomes  the  reconcili.i- 

'  Lipps,  Raumaeslhettc  u.  geometrtscb-optiscbe  Tauschiingen. 
'  Mitchell,  Growth  and  Structure  of  the  MinJ,  Lcct.  viii. 
'  Baldwin,  Unpublished  Lectures  on  Aesthetics. 


1^4  ^^£  AESTHETIC  EXPERIESCE. 

tion  of  these  two  factors  of  thought;  hut  it  can  not  he  reached 
bv  assigning  the  primacy  to  either.  It  is  precisely  in  such 
procedure  that  we  are  to  seek  for  the  rise  of  the  partial  and 
inadequate  epistemological  theories  of  the  present  time.  The 
conviction  is  thus  forced  upon  us  that  the  epistemological  prob- 
lem can  be  solved  only  by  the  setting  up  of  a  mode  of  conscious 
construcion  in  which  the  two  aspects  of  thought  are  reconciled 
and  thus  unified.  Such  mode  of  conscious  determination  is 
found  in  the  aesthetic  experience,  hence  the  conclusion  is  reached 
that  the  epistemological  and  the  aesthetic  have  arisen  together 
and  that  the  latter  has  functioned  always  as  the  organ  of  world 
unification  and  completion,  thus  satisfying  the  demands  of  the 
two-fold  aspect  of  all  thought. 

From  this  point  of  view,  the  aesthetic  experience  becomes 
an  absolute  experience,  but  not  in  the  sense  that  it  is  a 
static  and  meaningless  experience.  Here  I  think  is  found  the 
fruitfulness  of  the  present  point  of  view  in  contrast  with  the 
Intellectualistic  or  Voluntaristic  or  pure  Affectivistic.  New  dual- 
isms will  continue  to  rise  but  as  Professor  Baldwin  has  shown, 
such  dualisms  will  be  those  of  fact  and  not  of  meaning.'  Hoth 
types  of  meaning  are  now  objective  to  the  self  as  the  presup- 
position of  control,  so  that  we  can  conclude  with  the  statement 
of  Professor  Baldwin  that  with  the  rise  of  the  aesthetic  experience 
consciousness  has  a  way  of  finding  its  dynamics  intelligible  as  a 
truthful  and  so  far  a  static  meaning,  and  also  of  acting  upon  its 
established  truths  as  immediate  and  so  far  dynamic  satisfactions; 
thus  reaching  the  only  tenable  absolute  as  an  experience  in 
which  all  contrasted  meanings  as  relative  and  instrumental  are 
removed.  If  we  define  the  epistemological  problem  as  the 
problem  of*  transcending  the  subject,' of 'constituting  the  totality 
which  we  call  the  real  world,' of  "forming  the  idea  of  an  absolute 
experience  in  which  phenomenal  distinctions  are  nurgetl,  a 
whole  become  immediate  ar  a  higher  stage  without  losing  any 
richness,"  or  finally  "the  complete  embodiment,  in  individual 
form  and  in  final  fulfilment,  of  the  internal  meaning  of  finite 
ideas,"  and  further  define  the  aesthetic  experience  as  a  mode  of 

•  Baldwin,  Thought  anJ  Things,  Vol.  II.  Appendix,  II. 


MODERX  THOVGHT.  1 55 

conscious  determination  in  which  a  higher  mode  of  immediacy 
is  reached  by  the  merging  of  the  duahsms  and  relativisms  of 
thought,  hght  is  at  once  thrown  upon  the  resort  to  the  aesthetic 
experience  in  the  history  of  the  development  of  the  thought  of 
the  race;  and  the  thesis  here  presented,  that  tiie  aesthetic  has 
arisen  with  the  epistemological  and  functions  as  the  epistem- 
ological  principle  of  world-completion  and  interpretation  is 
confirmed. 


OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


BIOGRAPHICAL  SKETCH. 

William  Davis  Furry  was  born  June  21,  187^,  at  PVostburg, 
Maryland.  Prepared  for  college  in  the  Public  Schools  of  Wash- 
ington County,  Maryland,  and  under  the  private  instruction 
of  Professor  Auiiustus  Schaeffer  in  Latin  and  Mathematics  and 
Professor  Charles  Veneziani  in  Greek  and  French.  He  grad- 
uated from  the  University  of  Notre  Dame  (Indiana),  \sirh  the 
degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts  in  1900,  receiving  honorable  men- 
tion in  Greek,  Political  Science  and  Philosophy.  Was  I*rofes- 
sor  of  advanced  Latin  and  Greek  in  Ashland  College,  Ashland, 
Ohio,  i900-'o2,  and  Professor  of  Philosophy  and  Psychology 
l902-'04.  Was  a  graduate  student  in  Philosophy  in  the  Uni- 
versity of  Chicago  at  times  from  i90i-'o4.  Received  the  Mas- 
ter of  Arts  degree  from  the  University  of  Notre  Dame,  1904. 
Entered  the  Johns  Hopkins  University  in  October,  1904,  as  a 
graduate  student  in  Philosophy,  including  Psychology,  Experi- 
mental Psychology  and  Biology.  He  held  the  Fellowship  in 
Philosophy  and  Psychology,  i9o6-'o7,  and  received  the  degree 
of  Doctor  of  Philosophy,  1907.  After  receiving  his  doctor's 
degree  he  was  awarded  the  Henrv  E.  'Johnston,  Jr.,  Research 
Scholarship. 

It  is  a  most  pleasant  duty  for  the  writer  to  acknt)wkdge  his 
indebtedness  to  the  Professors  in  the  Department  of  Philoso- 
phy and  Psychology  in  the  Johns  Hopkins  University:  to  Pro- 
fessor Griffin  under  whom  he  has  done  work  in  Modern  Phil- 
osophy; to  Professor  Stratton  for  the  interest  which  he  has 
shown  in  this  piece  of  work  throughout  its  preparation;  and  to 
Professor  Baldwin,  not  only  for  the  helpfulness  of  his  criticism 
and  suggestions  in  preparing  this  work  for  the  press,  but  more 
especially  for  the  untiring  and  sympathetic  care  with  which  he 
has  directed  the  writer's  philosophical  studies  during  his  resi- 
dence in  the  Johns  Hopkins  University. 


" 


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